


You're a Disease I'm Underneath

by opti



Category: Parks and Recreation
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst, Dark, Explicit Sexual Content, F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Recovery, Smut, Widowed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-21
Updated: 2015-05-18
Packaged: 2018-03-02 13:58:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 22
Words: 38,273
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2814476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/opti/pseuds/opti
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When April loses something she's taken for granted, the days of support - the visits - they all make her grateful; thankful for Ann Perkins.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. There Will Be Bones

**Author's Note:**

  * For [RebeccaDopplemeyer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RebeccaDopplemeyer/gifts).



> This is _technically_ an extension of a oneshot from No One Like You (chapter 24), my April/Andy collection, but it is definitely an April/Ann story.
> 
> Title is taken from the lyrics to Jesu's "We All Faulter."

For Ann, dreams are welcome. In each one, as she sits up in bed, a short figure makes way over to her and takes no time in pressing her lips on Ann's. Whatever materials hiding their bodies are thrown away for desperate touches, Ann's fingers sliding along smooth skin and the figure's hands working their way between Ann's legs. It's because of nights like these, this ecstasy and loneliness, that Ann can get through the dreams.

"Please," she whispers in sleep. 

The visitor obliges, and the black mess of hair leaves a trail along her stomach until lips meet flesh and Ann's dreams melt into that same passion every time. Every single time she tries to look through the darkness, to see the face that she's cupping between her legs, and to watch April's eyes as she brings Ann to a crumbling orgasm. When the shadows do lift, a lamp or the sun alleviating them, there's no figure in her bed. There's no April - just Ann and her sweat and her own hands. 

There's no reason she's still having those dreams, not with the way things have been going. It's unfair to pretend that she can think of April like that, and in a selfish fit of desire Ann hoped once that this would make things easier for them. But it doesn't.

Not with who she's become.

 

* * *

 

April only knows nightmares. Every step, every breath, is a night terror extending itself throughout the day until she can't breathe anymore. The carpet speaks to her, running water that sounds like him, and liquor that can only numb the pain for a little while. Only a little while until she opens another bottle and drowns those thoughts out again.

When she was younger, even a year back, April took  _everything_ for granted and she realizes that now. Now when her house, and only her house, reeks of unwashed clothing, booze, and dog instead of all those things and him. So she drinks more to hide that stench, to keep herself hidden, and stays away from work. She can't get anything done when all she has to do is look at anyone in City Hall and instantly be reminded of what she's taken for granted.

What was taken from her just hours before they could restart their life. Andy was just now learning how important he was, how successful he could be, and on that return flight from London suddenly knew nothing. Suddenly he wasn't  _anything_.

"I miss you," she mumbles to no one in particular.

She talks to herself often, delusional in her hope that he might answer back, and April simply can't get away with that at work. People notice - people like Leslie, and Ron, and  _Ann_.

 

* * *

 

Ann puts together the same bag she does every single day. There's water, two refrigerated meals that Ann prepares, and a sleeping pill in a small plastic case. She knew better than to let anyone give April a full prescription, knowing what she's tried before, so she goes daily to deliver the kit to April. It lets Ann sit, driving to the house, and think about what she's doing this for - whether it was because she actually cares about April and wants to see her find her way out of this pit, or if she hopes that she can get closer.

When it's like this, just before noon, Ann wishes that the woman inside the house would step outside and let the sun fall on her skin again. It would be nice to see April without, at best, artificial light surrounding her or the usual pitch black rooms. Knocking on the door, hoping April will step out, the door swings ajar a moment later and no one makes an appearance.

"C'mon," the normally dry voice is replaced by a dead intonation as April walks away from Ann.

"Hey," Ann says awkwardly, holding up the bag even though April isn't looking. "I brought the usual. I made a meatloaf yesterday, and there were leftovers so..."

There's always leftovers. No matter what Ann tells herself she always makes far too much just for herself. There's no reason for her to make these stops, following April into the living room and setting the bag on her kitchen counter. They sit like this for a while, every day, and neither of them say anything to one another. It's a few hours - silence, dust, and shallow breaths - before April puts her head on the armrest and curls up into a ball.

Each time it happens a little bit of Ann breaks, seeing that form crawl away and helpless to do anything. It's not her place to, even if all she wants to do is pull April into her lap and wrap her arms around her. Ann just wants to tell her that she can be all right if April lets herself, and if she lets Ann help. 

But there's nothing to do other than walk over to April, huddled up and breaking tact to let loose a few tears, and kiss her on the forehead. Whether she means it as simple comfort or for her own benefit, Ann isn't sure. Either way, April never reacts to that contact in any other way than a sudden burst of strangled breath. The same words follow, too:

"Go away," she'll say with ragged breaths. "Please... just go away, Ann."

"Okay," Ann will respond with, shaking herself because she just wants to reach through that black veil April's hiding behind.

She wants to pull back the curtains, the ones in the living room and otherwise, and let light in. Maybe not for her own benefit, but maybe just to see April again - and not with her eyes. Ann has more to see in April than her features, despite how dearly she misses her eyes and those long fingers usually stuck up in the air rudely gestured at her, but she can't do it just yet. She can only leave the sleeping pill, and the water, and the overcooked meatloaf likely soaked with a tear or two. 

"Stay," April says that day.

Her hand catches Ann's when she's about to leave just after she's gently kissed April again. Then, April looks up at her and Ann feels that slow shattering all over again. Instead of a stare that's normally reserved with hatred and loathing, April's look catches Ann with a disarming frailty. She quickly gets over the scorching feeling of the younger woman's hand moving to her leg, April falling back to the couch and the armrest.

So Ann stays, not sure what to do. April doesn't move either, but an hour passes and she picks at the meatloaf. After a few bites she discards the tupperware, which Ann collects and puts back in her bag, only to sit up and shiver again. 

"Thanks," she says in a small voice, Ann only just able to catch the words in their entirety. 

"You're... anytime April," and Ann smiles.

If she didn't smile she would comment on April's frayed hair, the circles under her eyes, and how defeated she looks. But she can't think that, definitely can't say a word of that to April, so she just accepts the thanks with a plastered on smile and leaves a few hours later than usual.

 

* * *

 

Ann has the dream again, except this time she barges into April's house. They say nothing to each other, April's mouth moving in unsure patterns before Ann crosses the distance and kisses her with the full force that Ann needs. They're both shivering in some strange cold, their hands jittery as they reach up to the other's face and back to meet together and lace fingers, before April starts crying. 

Her face contorted like that, and Ann knows what she must be thinking, brings the whole fantasy to a close. It turns into something else though, something Ann didn't realize she wanted. It's April laying her head in Ann's lap, letting her stroke that black mass of hair and whisper comforting words to her. They punctuate with presses of their lips before April's red face is closer to Ann's again, and soon Ann's laying her across the sofa with less haste than the other dreams.

The woman lies back and Ann removes the same sweatpants she's likely been wearing for days, leaving tender impressions of her lips along thighs and wet, hot skin until her lips meet April in a sweltering sense of closure. Tasting April, even in sleep, was usually just for her own benefit - to know every inch of the woman she couldn't have - but now it's because she wants to feel April come to a halt in release.

Ann wants to look up across April's body and see heaving breasts, closed eyes, and a look of unbridled pleasure not for her own edification but just to make April happy. Making love to April could be her comfort, even if it was just her imagination. The dream is punctuated with a sad, little whine escaping April's mouth when Ann suckles and, eventually, wakes up.

Breathing hard in bed, Ann wipes away a bead of sweat and buries herself in the pillow. Her eyes squeeze tight as she chases that dream again, running desperately for April so that she can at least comfort her in sleep. At least, in that, Ann could help her. Maybe she could even save her.

 

* * *

 

One breath, two drinks. 

Repeat on loop, in step with one of Mouserat's albums, and that's April's day. Everything flows together into a miasma of horrible thoughts, dredged up memories that make her cry more, and Ann's visits. On some level she's happy for the human contact but only because she can take that pill and have a dreamless rest for a night.

In that, she  _is_ thankful. Because of Ann she's forgotten some of those fitful nights. In part, April knows a more comfortable night because she's locked the door to their bedroom and refuses to go in there ever again. If she has her way that bed will rot with that pillow on it, those sheets, and collapse in on itself so that April never has to think about it again. She can have control in the physical reality around her even if inside her mind it's nothing but relentless memory and regret.

 

* * *

 

"Maybe we can be okay," Ann tells Leslie. 

"Maybe," she says through a mouthful of whipped cream. 

"I just don't know how to help her," she mutters and picks at her own salad, looking back up to Leslie. "Everyone misses her."

"Yeah," Leslie sighs, pursing her lips in the way that lets Ann know any more talk will only lead to fits of unwelcome crying for the both of them. "I think she just needs someone, y'know."

"I get that," Ann nods, chewing and trying to ignore that she  _wants_ to be that someone so bad it hurts. "I'll keep checking up on her for you Leslie."

"Oh Ann, you're too perfect," Leslie holds her hand and Ann smiles because if she doesn't the other woman will know something's wrong.

In reality she's a miserable failure, a horrible friend, and desperate. She's so desperate for April that she was willing to fantasize about the woman's body all night, yet not strong enough to say a word to her when she delivered her pathetic attempt at a care bag. She doesn't take the bottles out of April's fridge, or take her to someone at the hospital and use one of Ann's myriad built up favors, and for what?

So that she can see her every day. So that she can kiss her every day, even if it's just on her forehead like a worrying mother. It's a selfish streak of doubt because Ann worries that if she helps April then they might not be different at the end. 

"I have to go," Ann jolts out of the bench without another thought, her eyes watering immediately. "I... I just-"

"Oh right, visit to April soon," Leslie smile at her and Ann's thankful she's inundated with work or she might notice Ann's tears.

Or maybe she does notice and doesn't question it. Maybe she knows. Either way, Ann has to collect herself enough to set up the bag for the day.

 

* * *

 

"Thanks," April says slowly for the seventh time in seven days.

"You're welcome," Ann's learned to say that with a warm comfort in her chest.

It's not what she really wants - April still drinks, and her breath is always heavy with alcohol, and never leaves the house either - but it's something. At least now she can see April in clean clothes and with some color in her cheeks from consistent meals. Seven days, seven dreams, and seven nights where Ann wants to knock on the door and share that couch with April just to let her know she's there. 

"For y'know..." she falters for a moment, her mouth hanging open and hands unsure what to do, "um... for trying."

"I'll always try April," Ann says calmly, ignoring how it sounds in her own head.

"Yeah... thanks," and it's so quiet that Ann barely hears her.

April pulls her into a hug for a brief second before standing up and following her out to the front door. She shrugs at Ann when the door's half-open but doesn't cross the threshold, leaving Ann to walk out alone. 

Outside, in twilight Pawnee, Ann lets out a choked sob at what just happened. It's not much, but April's speaking to her in semi-complete sentences and it's incredible. Maybe the next time she visits there will be lights, and water instead of wine, and April will have a small smile. Perhaps Ann can tell a joke and April will grimace at her like old times, except she  _could_ smile. Or, maybe, when she goes to visit the next day all that's left in the house is a body.

Maybe there will be bones where there was April.


	2. Candlelight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll update this today and, likely, tomorrow but then I'll be out of town for a week or so. I promise there will be some forward movement with the story now that we've built up a little foundation :)

It was too much to expect a clean refrigerator. 

When Ann goes in the next day, her lunch breaks now used for these visits, the first thing she sees on the kitchen counter is an empty bottle of wine. If she had to guess, the bottle was emptied before day had even really broken. She tries to stop that, Ann at one point wrestling a bottle out of April's hands before she fell back in the couch and mumbled to herself, but a little comfort can't go that far. Just sitting with her for a few hours isn't going to stop the dependency.

So when she walks into the living room proper and April's tipping back a box of wine Ann isn't surprised, only disappointed. Setting the usual down on the counter, Ann takes the bottle and puts it by the others that she means to recycle. There's a litany of mistakes written there; the first few dozen that Ann couldn't get to, the next handful that she tried to pry away from April, and the one just now. Sitting back down on the couch, Ann opens her lunch and passes April the leftover casserole. 

"Thanks," the other woman grumbles when she takes the food, opening up the plastic dishware and picking at it with the fork. 

"I know you said you hate tuna salad, but I thought you might like this," Ann explains, nodding and speaking for the both of them. "My mom gave me that recipe, but I never get it right."

There's no assurance from April that she's done well, there isn't any praise to be expected really, and Ann sighs with each bite of her salad. The only light in the house is a lamp in the corner of the living room, where Champion's bed used to be, and two candles that Ann insisted on lighting. It was mostly for the smell, and when the house starts to smell like vanilla and cleaning solution Ann can feel a little better.

Every time Ann thinks like that - doing something just so that she can feel better about being near April - it jostles her out of some insane fantasy where this is all some path to their future. In her mind it'll be where April can overcome the death of her husband and fall into Ann's lap like a gift she's never deserved. 

"Y'know,  you don't have to eat it," Ann smiles when April scrunches up her nose at the first bite. "I can go get you a pizza or something."

"Fine," April says, putting the food down on the coffee table and going back to curling up on the couch.

"I'll order it," she jumps up and doesn't realize until she's pulled her phone out that April's taking longer gulps from the forgotten box of wine.

Staring down the couch, the woman that Ann craves is stretched out with a box of wine idly tipped over her every few seconds. The hair that she's wanted to wrap her hands in for far too long is scraggly and frayed, and the subtle movements of her hands and looks from her eyes are all gone. The only person that's left there is a scared, tired girl that Ann's too afraid to question.

"D'you want some water?" Ann offers, but April just looks at her and takes another drink. "Or not, that's okay too..."

"No it's not," April mutters but she doesn't hesitate to continue.

"Why not stop then?" Ann asks dumbly, just because maybe she'll get something out of April then.

"It's easier to be numb all the time," April says flatly, openly. 

It's the most open she's been in a very long time, maybe ever in Ann's case, and in some way that's a step forward. But this April isn't the one that's prevalent in her dreams, and Ann doesn't know if that's okay. She doesn't know if this imagined version of April is what she wants when the real person is shattering every step of the way. 

 

* * *

 

Those dreams, they don't come and go. They are the purest constant in Ann's life anymore. When she first thought of April like that it was years ago when they'd only known each other for a few weeks. It wasn't because of some incredibly deep sign of love at first sight. No, it was just because Ann needed something new to think about when she avoided sex and instead took care of herself.

There wasn't any love there, and she didn't intend for these thoughts to spiral out of control over and over again, but she wondered what that intern's lips would feel like for a moment and in that second she changed everything. A little lust spread through her for years, always struggling to chain itself and not overflow, until Ann never thought of anyone else. Even when she slept with men all she could imagine was April instead of them, and when she slept she ran rampant in her dreams with the devious girl.

But that's it - it was lust. Nothing more.

 

* * *

 

 

If the only reason she wants to help her is to be a good friend, then Ann could live with that. That isn't what crosses her mind then, though. To Ann that sofa, those cushions and that pillow, are not meant for Ann to sit with April and rub her back and tell her things will be okay. That couch was where they were supposed to find each other wanting, and to forget any past inhibition, but that's gone now.

That's lost to the trembling lips around the carton, and to Ann putting her phone away and sitting next to April. It takes her a second to work up the courage to move her hand at all, but when she does Ann finds herself slowly rubbing April's knee and eventually her back. The other woman looked at her briefly but eventually sighed into Ann's hand. Only a moment of this lasts before Ann stills on April's shoulder and the temptation is in her grasp.

"Why're you doing this?" April asks her suddenly, pulling her from the reverie. 

"Because I'm your friend," and she struggles with that last word like it'll kill her. 

"You're a good friend," April says slowly, taking another drink before dropping the box on the floor.

"I could be better," Ann deflects and gives another awkward chuckle. "I could be a way better friend, to be honest."

It's a horrible truth, and both of them know it but April's too gone from the alcohol to comment in her usual blaise way. They don't say much after that. Neither of them comments on what Ann said, and eventually the sparse lighting in the room and the drinking puts April in a drowsy sleep. The two candles on the table are burning through wax and the wicks curl oddly on themselves though the smell and small hint of light is still there. A light snore comes from April just then and Ann tells herself she can't smile when a smirk appears.

Standing up, Ann moves the thin quilt that Leslie made just a few weeks ago onto the sleeping woman. When Ann sees her like this - peaceful and eyes closed - a small weight's removed from her shoulders. She doesn't have to think about April being awake and drinking too much until she collapses under her own mind.

"Thanks," she mumbles in sleep, nestling into the warmth.

"You're welcome April," Ann says to her despite knowing there won't be an answer. "Love you."

It slips out of her mouth without a second thought, Ann's mind wandering with the possibilities of normalcy for them. Maybe it was drinking boxed wine and eating bad casseroles together until April fell asleep, too drunk at two in the afternoon to stay awake, and Ann could tell her that in confidence. Whether she means it is a different story, because Ann doesn't know what those words mean when their intent is to pull clothes off of this woman.

But now, she freezes and her eyes are wide in expectation of April's waking form. She's told her that before, as a friend, but without that same hanging syllable and desperate tinge. Because, to Ann, that's all she has anymore - it's all cloying and clinging; hopeful.

"Love you too," April mutters, eyes still closed.

Ann leaves with those words buried in her mind. If she could have them tattooed across her body just from April's lips that would surely be too perfect, but for now listening to her say those words in hazy half-consciousness was better than Ann could ever hope for. The best Ann had, in reality, was her weak attempts at helping this woman get better. And for what? 

So that her dreams could become reality, and that was it. It was so she could know for real what the taste of April's mouth was, and for her legs to be Ann's to take, but not because she was a good friend. Not because she wants to see April get out of this rut out of selflessness - it's to feel April curl into Ann's fingers and moan into her without a tear in her eye or worry in her voice. So that begging can come real.

"Please," April might whisper into Ann's ear, clawing into her shoulder in request.

That never happens though, and Ann doesn't know anything but that one small embrace they shared days ago. It sticks to her skin for so long that Ann fantasizes about a different, alternate ending to that short encounter. One where April turns to face her and her lips come crashing down on Ann's.

"I'm glad you're here," April  _could_ say with a small smile, pulling Ann in for a hug that becomes something more.

But even that doesn't happen, and Ann's both angry and confused why she isn't doing more. But what more can she do? What more is there to do?

 

* * *

 

 

A bit of candlelight is all they had, and maybe that was all they needed. April couldn't remember anything when she woke up other than those toxic candles and immediately snuffs them out. Shrugging off Leslie's quilt April goes over to the counter for the sleeping pill that Ann always leaves and downs it quickly. 

There might be a day where she doesn't need that pill, and where she can think of anything else, but for now April's going to fall back into medicated sleep and relax. She can pretend that nothing in her world is real and find blank comfort in her dreamless sleep. Something about that was infinitely comforting, just the thought of getting away from everything, and it's what makes April consider the handgun Ron gave her years ago over and over again.

Until then though, April would sleep.


	3. I Turn On

"Leslie, I don't think I can do this anymore," Ann buries her head in her hands, sitting in her friend's office. 

"Oh Ann, you can, I believe-"

"I don't think you get it," Ann says half-sobbing. "I can't see her like this anymore."

"It's hard on all of us, but you've been such a good friend and-"

"Stop saying that!" Ann explodes suddenly, standing up. "I'm not a good friend, and I can't be her... I just can't, okay?"

Leslie doesn't say a word to her as Ann leaves the office and eventually City Hall altogether. Rushing home, she sits alone in her own house and pretends she's doing okay. It’s still raining outside and the pattering of all that water against the windows makes Ann curl into herself on the couch.

 

* * *

 

It's raining when Ann goes in to see April, all before that outburst, and she likes the gray atmosphere it has around April's house. Because, at least, she can turn on a lamp or two and light another candle. When she knocks on the door and April answers quickly, Ann wants to smile but it's impossible for her to ignore how she looks. With a little illumination behind her, and in nothing other than a massive flannel overshirt, Ann chuckles and smiles nervously when she walks in and tries not to look at the backs of her legs when she walks.

It's close, it's almost perfect, but then she remembers the greasy hair and tired eyes. Her hair’s up in a messy ponytail and not freely flowing, thick and waiting for Ann’s fingers to run through it. April’s eyes don’t look as runny or wandering as usual and there's only one bottle in addition to the collection that was there the previous night when she follows April into the den.

Silence follows them until Ann turns around to say something but April’s too fast and interrupts her.

“Hey,” April says slowly to her, threading her fingers together and looking up, “I’m… all this is making me thankful, y’know, that you’re here.”

“Don’t worry about it, April,” Ann shrugs her off until the other woman takes her in for another hug.

It lasts longer than the last one and when Ann pulls back she looks into April’s eyes, a microscopic distance between them seeming so far, before something breaks.

The room feels different for them in that moment. April’s eyes lose all of her tired glaze and she stares back, all without removing her arms from around Ann. Her hands run circles around Ann’s shoulder blades and it feels so amazing and perfect that she doesn’t bother to think about any of it.

“You’re so…” Ann starts, her breath catching for a second when their faces both move an inch.

Still she denies herself that crossed distance, and when she eventually does her lips tremble against April’s for a moment before committing fully to the kiss. It’s desperate, aching, and closed until April’s hand folds around Ann’s shoulder and up to her cheek when she’s open, wet, and wanting.

Something’s wrong about this but Ann can’t quite put her finger on it and she doesn’t know if she wants to. The subtle movement of April’s tongue is all she can focus on, and how she takes Ann’s free hand to ride it up underneath the shirt.

Moving to the pimpled flesh on her chest, Ann doesn’t hesitate for a moment in taking all of her breast in hand and quickly undoing the shirt from April. With kisses falling down her jaw and neck, April just breathes harder into Ann’s hair when lips replace pinching fingers. Ann doesn’t bother to question why this is happening, only that April’s arching into her mouth and the curve of her spine feels so good in Ann’s hand, all until April moans out that request:

“Please,” she whispers, entirely bare when Ann looks down.

In fleeting seconds, April’s on her back against the cushions and Ann kisses her again while her hand finds April’s folds begging for her fingers. They give in, the both of them, for a second before Ann lets two fingers take over, delving deep, and April gives a harsh, panicked yelp.

“Don’t stop…” April pleads to her, her voice quiet. “Ann, don’t leave me. Don’t go; don’t leave.”

“I promise I won’t,” Ann says immediately, uncaring how thin the words are coming from her, moving away from April’s mouth.

While she continued to pump into April, sliding just as perfectly as Ann imagined and the shivering figure making those same beautiful strangled gasps, Ann let her mouth fall in a haggard line down the other woman. Her sweat flecks along Ann’s lips and it just makes the distance more aggravating, until she’s on her hips and her thighs. She’s so near that Ann salivates and feels her jaw go lax, kissing and nibbling at April’s inner thigh until she moves upward.

Her mouth hovers over April, still pumping and pressuring her in time with the folding muscles, and Ann licks her lips before she gently clamps onto April’s clit-

“Ann?” April’s voice, a steady beat, shatters everything. “Ann, are you okay?”

The perfect reality around her is gone. Falling rain outside the house, the tapping against the roof and the walls, reminds her what she’s actually seeing. April’s still wearing the shirt, her hair’s still up, and she’s looking at Ann like something’s gone horribly wrong with her. With a moment of realization, Ann unhooks her hands from April’s – they had somehow laced their fingers together – and stopped that damning licking of her lips that must have been the sign.

“I’m… yeah, I’m okay,” Ann stutters, chuckling. “I think I might have… did I, did we…?”

“You kissed my neck and wouldn’t stop staring at me,” April says and something about her words and the lack of total, vitriolic hate is soothing. “You were being super weird.”

“Oh, yeah, sorry… I must’ve just, y’know, gotten carried away,” she tries to explain but April just squints in confusion. “I had a couple drinks before I came here, so that must be it.”

That was a complete lie, and April probably knew it, but Ann said it anyways. Something about hiding away from her felt right, even if the younger woman didn’t melt into the fury that Ann would have expected. She almost looks and sounds disappointed. Without another word, shrugging off April’s hands, Ann rushes out of the house and into the rain.

Ignoring the voice that calls her back in, Ann runs out into the rainy Pawnee night and hurries with her keys. Water jumps off of her lips and onto her hands, wet and serene just like April felt in her hallucination – it was so surreal, so perfect and what they could be, that Ann gives in to the terrified squeals inside telling her to run the hell away from that woman. This isn’t what she wanted.

She didn’t need to be driving away from April’s house, drenched from rain head to toe, and thinking that she had betrayed someone that she was starting to actually feel something more than grasping lust for. This isn’t how it was supposed to work. Ann was supposed to fantasize and help take of April until she got better, and then they could go back to who she was; who they were. In the end they could stay apart and Ann could have this imagined, fantasy April and not the broken, beaten one in reality.

 

* * *

 

 

When Ann leaves, April tries to follow her out into the rain. The open door tells her to continue but she can’t. Her feet just won't allow her to leave that house. Something about all of this is changing her but April doesn’t know how to handle it. She just wants Ann to come back and talk to her – to help her like she’s helped already – until April falls asleep without the aid of that pill.

Just maybe, with Ann there, she won’t need it. But Ann drives away so fast April doesn’t have the chance to do anything. She could call, or drive herself, but that all feels too complicated, especially when she feels entirely isolated by the speeding car racing down flooding streets.

Every day she’s expected Ann, and every day she comes, but the next day April’s all alone again. It makes her take comfort in that shirt again, balling it up in her hands and taking in the smell, before she crawls towards that bedroom door and stares at the frame for a second. Another second and she might bother to go find the keys, but she turns around in time to walk back into the living room, sit on the couch, and bury her head in her hands with eyes fighting back more tears.

That’s what she is – alone. She can’t bother to go into work, see her friends, and she can’t even think about him for more than a second without feeling a strange disconnect between loneliness and, strangely, betrayal. Even worse, she doesn’t understand the latter or why it has any business burying itself in her chest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> See y'all in a week. Might be slow to respond to feedback after tonight... so, uh, sorry!


	4. Silhouettes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whatever, I got hold of a laptop and this has been rolling around my head since finishing ch.3! Consider it a really moody Christmas present from me to you.

It was the same dream as every other night for April, the one she hates. The street that they walk down, the houses they pass, everything is exactly the same. His hand's all sweaty and weird just like it always used to be when they held hands, and he smiles like she's the only thing in the world. Her heart races every step of the way because April knows that this dream is going to hurt so much in the morning - whether she actually knows that or just feels the snapping of every nerve in her body at it already.

The same choking words are attempted, but April can't say any of them just like every other time. Most of all, she fears he'll say those four damning words that April can't go a minute in her day without thinking. 

_You never loved me_

They bury their way into her house, and her skin, but April tries to go on without thinking of them. No matter what she can do, they're always there. She screams at the walls, telling them to go away, but they still haunt her. Nothing has ever been less true in her life, but they still come after her. 

Now, in that dream, they never come. After the time she's spent wondering what's going on in her mind those words never come. There's no tinge of hate or betrayal in them like she expects, and April's only in a sweat when her eyes open in the middle of the night. Normally after those dreams she would wake screaming, crying, or some combination of the two until she drinks herself into a shaky sleep.

When she wakes up on the couch, April sits up and takes deeper breaths. She can do this, even if it means she has to go it alone - she can do it.

 

* * *

 

"Leslie, don't make me-"

"I'm not making you, but... you've been there for her every other time and now," the voice on the other end of the call stills. "You made her go to that  _alone_ , Ann."

"Please don't throw that in my face," Ann huffs back angrily, like she hasn't been sitting at home thinking the exact same thing. 

The thought makes Ann's even demeanor falter. The image of April standing there, no one there to tell her it was fine to cry and offer their shoulder, all combined with actually getting to see sunlight through her hair and in her eyes again was almost too much. Almost, but not quite. 

 

* * *

 

At the foot of a grassy hill, where it curves a little and shoots up suddenly into a miniscule cliff face, April has to sit on her knees again or she might collapse. For an hour she's tried to say something, anything, and all that's come out is hoarse whines and dry coughs. The sun was out in full force that day, something that made April sick to her stomach. What right did it have to be out, boisterous and bright, when everything she has is broken and gone?

She wasn't there for the actual funeral. It breaks her heart to think about it every single time, but April wasn't there. Despite no body being recovered from the plane crash, Andy's family asked for her to show but she didn't. She couldn't bear to see the little stone with his name marked on it. Everything would be too real then, and April - at that point - couldn't handle the reality of his death.

A wind blows through the grass, no leaves or branches to stop it, and April gets a face full of her own hair before she pulls it all back to look at the stone clearly through the stiff breeze.

"Y'know," she finally whispers to her hands, staring down at them, "I never got to really... like, really say how much I love you. It's kinda dumb, really, but with you..."

She sniffs, holding her head for a moment before looking back up. Hoping the wind would quicken just to clear her eyes of the tears, April turns her head back and forth for a second before looking back at the stone. She rolls down the sleeves of a shirt she washed that morning, the cold coming back despite the sun and its heat.

"With you... gone, I'm seeing things different now," April smiles because if she doesn't she'll break down, and if there was anything he loved it was her smile. "Like, how you were always right about Ann. You told me she was great and I always just made fun of her but... she is, y'know? She's really... great."

The wind picks up for a moment, making April shiver and wrap her arms around herself. Blades of grass from a recently mowed patch fly up and over Andy's marker before falling down in front of it. The little movement reminds her that she never thought to bring anything. No flowers or even a bag of gummy bears or something at all. 

Then again, she can't think of anything else she could give him than herself. It was the best she could do, no matter how poor an excuse that turns out to be for April. Thoughts are scattered for her that entire day because they're all  _feelings_ and tearing her in two different directions. One of them she knows Andy would have hated to see, and the other only possible because he's gone. Either way, April can't imagine what that bizarre sense of estrangement is doing to her.

Even then she couldn't stop thinking about those vague, unsure responses her body, her mind, was having to Ann. Every night she craves the return of the nurse, but she doesn't come. April almost leaves her a message along with the desperate text, but nothing comes out of that. That sense of wrong, of an impending dread, was still lodged in her mind and April has no idea what to do with it.

Maybe it's because she's admitting how wrong she was about Ann, or maybe it was something else. What that could be though, April didn't know. All she knew is that seeing Ann, having company and someone to smile at her in an effort to pull one out of this alcohol-dependent mess, makes April happy. 

"I should really come out here more," she laughs to herself through the slowing wind and waving grass. "You always listened to me when it mattered, babe..."

And that, the one little slip of the tongue, makes April stop. The moment the word leaves her lips it's all over and she has to stand up, pushing her sleeves into her eyes to sop up the instant wetness in her eyes. Turning around, she has to walk away from him or else she might say something else that makes her body freeze up and go into shock again. The breeze is dead, falling behind her every step, until April looks over her shoulder at his spot beneath that little hill. Overshadowed, tiny, insignificant.

April walks back to the taxi and goes home, alone.

 

* * *

 

Ann looks at the text over and over again, letting the words twist around in her head until they mean little to her. 

_I miss your visits_

That's all it says, but to Ann it makes her mind do a thousand different laps in reverse all at once. There was something different in April's eyes after she apparently kissed her on the neck, something that Ann continually wonders at and why she didn't get a punch or a smack to the face in retaliation, but this couldn't be it. But she kept reading the text and wondering why she left.

Something told her that it might have  _actually_ been because she couldn't keep seeing April splintered mentally and emotionally, but Ann knew better. She knows better than to let that side of her take control. The last time it took control she had the most surreal fantasy of fucking April on that couch, all while still holding her and hoping that things could be different. Different in what way, Ann still doesn't know. Nothing about her feelings make sense anymore. 

Before she could chalk up her relationship with April to acquaintances that one part of wanted to sleep with, and then a little obsession that faded slowly, and now she doesn't know what to call it. When it was dreams of soft skin and nothing more, things were easy. There's something else inside now, something that Ann tried to fight off and managed to successfully get out of her system before, and she doesn't know what to do with it. How can she look at April, after the horrible thoughts she's had and the awful assumptions after Andy's death, and say that she legitimately loved her?

So Ann doesn't text her back, or call, or anything. She just sits in her house, trying not to imagine April alone at the gravestone with her eyes encircled in red and tears. 

 


	5. Funny Heartbeat

Ann remembers the words that her idyllic dream-self had said, repeating over again in her head.

_I promise I won't_

She promised not to leave, not to let April do this alone. Now she sits in her house with a glass of wine and slams another back without a thought other than those words. At some point she would feel better about abandoning April, or at least she assumes. For now she can only think about how stupid she's being and that it'd be so simple just to walk back into that house - April didn't know anything. She wasn't hatching some vicious scheme like she usually would. 

That April was resting, left broken and without anyone to help her pick up the pieces. Even if she promised to stay with April until she was back to  _April_ , Ann can't do it. Until she looks back to her phone and scans that text again, Ann just can't see April like this. She's calling out and still Ann thinks she's too afraid to act on something more than a little fantasy, something so much more real.

 

* * *

 

April still doesn't want to drive - not if she sits behind the wheel and an errant thought cripples her - so she calls on a taxi again. On the drive she wonders how she's gotten this far. Just months ago she was unable to eat for days, only sustained on booze and long showers, and wore nothing but gigantic flannel and cargo shorts. The car takes her to City Hall, to Leslie, now.

Because of  _Ann_.

And that thought is so incredibly frightening because April knows what the root of that feeling is. Pushing herself further, April tries not to think about how easily she can think of this as a betrayal. Everything she tells herself comes up painful yet short in comparison to that realization.

"Ann's been... perfect," April told herself in the mirror earlier that morning. "I can do this.  _I_ can do this."

So she walks into Leslie's office without any fanfare, Ben sitting across from her and laughing at something she says. If anyone knew what to do, it would be them. When the older woman catches sight of April though, she stops completely and Ben looks confused. When they both stare at her April waves awkwardly until Leslie bounces up to her. 

"April!" she shouts, alerting everyone to her presence until April shoos Leslie back into her office, closing the door.

"Hi Leslie," April shakes her arms, totally unsure what to say or do. "I'll catch up with you guys later-"

"I'll just pretend I'm not here," Ben says with a smirk on his face, clearly trying to pull a sorely missed sarcastic comment out of her.

"Keep doing that," April quips and he gives a soft laugh. "Can I ask you something, though?"

"You could have just called-"

"This is  _really_ important Leslie," April complains. "Please, just listen okay?"

"No problem, no problemo, absolutely," Leslie waves her hands, sitting back on her desk before jumping back up with excitement. "We all just miss you so much-"

"Is it wrong that I feel like I'm ready to... y'know, move on?" April interrupts. "With... somebody?"

The other two quiet and share a look before Leslie's expression softens. April tries her best not to smile but can't help a slight smirk escaping with this change from shock to ready acceptance.

 

* * *

 

Ann drives back to April's in a hurry while trying to ignore the slight buzz and instead focus on her promise. Thankfully the rain stops a few seconds after she sets out to April's house, because the blinding torrents were worrying at first. At April's door Ann steels herself with a deep breath and knocks slowly.

When April opens the door she's clean, wearing her own clothes, and looks only a little pale. 

"Hey," Ann says shakily. 

"Good to see you again," April mumbles immediately, looking down at Ann's bag. "What d'you have today?"

"Oh yeah, I come bearing gifts," Ann tries her best plastered on smile, holding up two different liter bottles of water. "There's some spaghetti in here too if you want it-"

"Sounds good," the woman behind the threshold smiles and steps away for Ann to walk in.

It's a little thing, but it's enough for Ann to bite her lip and focus on keeping her stride steady. Crossing over, right next to April, Ann lets out a long breath and gives her a real smile this time. 

"Good to see you too," Ann chuckles, walking over to the dining room.

They set about eating spaghetti and water, April sitting at the little table on one end facing Ann on the other, and it's a quiet little meal. April slurps up the noodles in a hurry and Ann tries to hide her smile behind pasta and sauce but can't help it. After a few seconds where she knows she's staring at April, Ann looks away when the other woman stops chewing and just looks at her blankly.

"What?" she asks simply. "I'm eating, okay? Good God woman, you're not my mother."

"April..." and there's a strange intonation in her voice that Ann doesn't mind admitting right now.

"Ew, what?"

"That's the first time you've made fun of me in... months," Ann explains, her mouth half-open in shock and happiness. "I think this calls for a celebration."

"I'll get the wine," April says hurriedly.

Ann stops and bites her lip, but then softens and nods approvingly. Maybe it was the wrong thing to do, especially after Ann herself was already a few glasses deep, but she wants to celebrate this turn of events with April. Seeing her fall back ever so slightly into old jabs no matter how thin they were was a step forward that Ann wants to see again and again. Especially if those steps forward mean walking just a bit closer to her.

A few seconds later April returns with a box and pours out two full tall glasses of wine for them. 

"Wine's supposed to go with pasta, right?" April asks as she looks at the back of the box.

"I think. I dunno, I'm a really bad cook," Ann says with a halfhearted laugh. "You know that firsthand."

"Nah, this is good," she shrugs and takes another bite of noodles. "Really, you're not the worst. I mean, I've tasted better, but it's not like I'm eating from a garbage can or something."

Responding with a smile, Ann takes a sip from her wine and gets back to the food. With dinner finished not long after, they sit in the living room - on that couch - and continue emptying the box. At one point Ann swears she hears a  _laugh_ come out of April, but she can't be sure. It might have been a hoarse whisper or something, but Ann's going to think that April's laughing again.

Then, somewhere along the line, the atmosphere of the place changes. April's sole lamp seems to have found its shade again, the dim light requiring another one of Ann's aromatic candles, and they sit facing one another on the couch. Ann fingers her glass around the rim, sliding a wet finger across the edge in circles, until she looks up and sees April eyeing her movements intently.

Stopping abruptly, April looks up and she smiles almost - and Ann digs deep to find any other time this has ever happened -  _shyly_. 

"I promise I'll try to stop drinking," April says suddenly, putting down her empty glass.

"I promise I won't run out on you again," Ann tries, her lips tightly pursed. 

"Okay," April nods.

They quiet again and Ann swears they're just a bit closer, but that's probably the wine thinking for her. So she just enjoys the view of April with a smile just recently leaving her face and the memory of her laughing again. 

"Thanks," Ann starts, shifting off of her hands and unsure what to do with them. 

"For what? I should be thanking you-"

"For letting me back in," Ann looks down. "I left you out to dry and... it makes me a bad friend."

"Y'know, that might be the dumbest thing you've ever said," April scoots a little closer and this time Ann's fully aware of it, "and that's saying something."

They share grins before Ann tries to say something and can't find the words anymore. The closeness and the night in combination with the alcohol make her head spin, but she soldiers on if it means April will let her in again. 

"Listen, just get whatever you want to get off your chest... and," April shrugs and takes a deep breath, but all Ann can focus on is her chest heaving out and back in, "and I... I just forgive you, okay? As long as you keep coming back, I forgive you."

Ann tries to take her mind off of April's breasts but it's basically impossible. The unfortunate side effect of staring at April and being more than a little drunk, and just being asked to say whatever she wanted, was total absence of restraint.

"I really wanna fuck you," it comes out in a blur, Ann's mouth stumbling over every syllable. 

There's a dead silence for a few seconds before April's lips turn up and a small laugh starts up. Ann's mortified face tries to do anything other than grimace at her slip and April can't stop laughing at her. It's almost cruel. 

It's almost  _April_ , because only April would take an admission like that and laugh at her cruelly. She smiles in response to that and even manages a chuckle, hoping that this will all be swept under the rug. It would be nice, but sadly she knows that's not going to happen. April slides a little closer and Ann immediately shakes her head, squeezing her eyes tight to avoid another scene like the last, but when she opens her eyes again April's still there and definitely not a dream.

They both look down, avoiding the other's eyes until they snap back up. 

"I actually wanted to talk to you about something," April starts as she bites into her cheek. "So that's kinda great for you to say."

"Oh boy," Ann huffs out, sighing away any nerves she still has left because April's about to let loose for her seemingly strange neck kiss. 

Instead, April moves her hands shakily over to Ann's and fingers slide between fingers until they're joining hands. It's almost sweet but Ann's mind is doing backflips trying to come to terms with this change. But she lets it take hold of her like the dream because after another hopeful squinting of her eyes April's still definitely holding her hands. Again.

"When you kinda lost it last time... y'know, before you left," April explains slowly, their hands clutching close for the other's, "you kissed me and I did this and it felt... right."

"What, you held my hand?" Ann asks, still sure that she was the one that initiated everything that night.

"Yeah," the younger woman says quickly. "I... I don't know."

"It's fine," Ann reassures her, gently moving a thumb over April's knuckle as best she could. "It's cool... I mean, I liked it."

"Yeah?" April's voice has a tinge of hope in it that makes Ann shake all over for an instant. "I mean, I don't want to-"

"Say whatever you have to," Ann mumbles, smiling still and hoping that this next sentence is exactly what she's wanted to hear for so long. 

"God, that would take forever," April slumps before resuming her previous stature. "I mean, you've been perfect for me Ann. No matter what you think you did, you came back and you're here now. Everything you're doing here is... it's just perfect-"

"Dude, I didn't ask for a presidential address," Ann laughs, squeezing April's hands just a little tighter and being pleasantly surprised she doesn't grimace. "Pick up the pace!"

"You said it best," April chuckles and looks away with a smirk before finishing incredibly quietly. "I kinda want you to be around... more. If you still want to-"


	6. Cannibal Queen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now there's a reason for the ESC tag. Bumped the rating because... yeah.

There's only one method of interruption that makes sense to her.

The first thing Ann notices is that April tastes entirely like the awful wine they've been drinking. Her lips immediately stop moving when they make contact with Ann's and they're so  _warm_ and everything Ann's wanted to feel for so long that it doesn't register to stop. Instead she reaches forward and cups April's face, drunk and full on the night, trying her best not to force a deeper kiss. By now April's fallen backwards a bit until she's leaning on her hands and still unmoving.

Hot skin and wine, that's what she's always wanted but not like this. Ann starts to hesitate as April's reaction changes momentarily - closing her eyes finally and leaning back into Ann - before shaky hands push her away. Wide eyes and heavy breaths are all April has left from the looks of it, but she has to know.

"Did you... want that?" Ann asks slowly, keeping her distance and trying not to reach up and touch April's cheek again. "Do you want this?"

"I..." April starts and trails off, looking down and licking her lips with a languid flick of her tongue that Ann can't help but focus on.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I shouldn't-"

April doesn't let  _her_ answer this time, darting with her head still low to catch Ann's open mouth in hers. The fingers across Ann's arm are fidgety and scrambling for the material of her cardigan, like they're desperate for any contact at all, and April refuses to let her away without an intoxicated run of tongues. It's a few more moments, so sadly brief, until they break apart again.

"I need this," April admits in a low voice. 

In her head she says that she'll give April anything she wants, but at this point Ann's given up believing all the lies she makes up for herself. So she's going to enjoy the fact that April pushes her entire body against Ann's and holds her face like she doesn't want to look away ever again. The reality of things is so much better than the fantasy that Ann can't stop smiling. Ann's hand finds a bit of hair that fell across April's face, neatly tucking it behind her ear.

The look then, just after the strangely intimate gesture, would have broken Ann any other time. Now, though, she sort of understands what she wants from April. Or, rather, what she wants  _for_ April.

"What do you want?" Ann asks with a hoarse whisper, trying to suppress the warm reaction to April's hand running across her shoulder.

"Kiss me again," April says without breaking her stare. 

In the light of a berry scented candle and a shitty lamp, Ann watches with deviant glee as April leans forward with her eyes closed. The freely flowing hair is just as amazing to the touch as Ann knew it would be, and the small shadows of her collarbone's impressions hit Ann all at once. It's not everything she's wanted, but it's April and that wasn't going to change so she leans deeper into the kiss. Ann's hand immediately clutches April's face and slowly falls down from her face to her shoulder as the younger woman hums into her mouth.

The couch makes no noise as Ann's weight falls more and more on April, her hand dropping to hover over April's breast in anticipation. They break apart and April looks down before pushing Ann back a little, forcing that moving hand up to April's face. Nearly on her back, Ann smiles into April's kiss and lets herself fall backwards onto the sofa.

"I want this," April mumbles, her fingers going to the open edge of the cardigan and sliding it over Ann's shoulders. 

Shrugging it off quickly, Ann chuckles when April moves to her neck. The moist pressure there, and Ann's heavier breaths, combine perfectly when April squeezes her torso between Ann's legs and sits like that with her mouth moving towards the buttons of the blouse. 

Long fingers come to the rescue, April's hands even shakier than before but her look totally betraying anything that might be going on in the younger woman's head. Ann ignores that, instead focusing on the fact that there's bare skin available to April and she takes no time covering it in smaller kisses. Even as Ann lays back and looks down at April peppering the front clasp of her bra in kisses none of it seems real. Exposed, stiff nipples fall to April's mouth and none of it seems real.

Ann mutters incomprehensible things, her head swirling like April's tongue on her chest, just as she moves up to her elbows and brings April to her mouth again. The younger woman attacks her this time, the want clearly in her mouth and her touch. At some point April runs a hand up and into Ann's skirt and everything finally melts away. 

"I can do this," April says to herself almost like a rehearsed speech, moving off of Ann's thigh and out to get rid of the skirt.

"Yes you can," Ann laughs when April's fingers take over and her mouth hurries to Ann's stomach.

April presses against the edge of her panties, lips moving through the dry fabric until reaching a distinct change. Closing her eyes and lolling back into her shoulders, Ann tries to forget everything but those purple, wine-stained lips on her through soaked underwear and the dying lights around them illuminating April's face just barely. 

"I can do this," Ann hears again as April thumbs the underside of her panties. 

The second April moves down to her, stumbling just a little, and presses her mouth fully on Ann's pussy there isn't much left to do but whine her approval. April kisses and sucks down her lips, pressure that Ann's been craving for too long, until the only thing that does make sense anymore is looking down. Seeing April there, her mouth, and moving up to elbows so her arms can have access to thighs and fingers to Ann once more is all too much.

A thumb finds Ann's clit and moves haphazardly while April continues with her suckling. Somewhere along the line April's tongue slips from her mouth and buries itself inside Ann, making her body do somersaults at the presence of the muscle delving. Things blur together into a furious mess of April's tongue and her nose and hands before Ann's letting out a high moan and tightening every muscle in her body at once. April stays there, kissing her thighs and moving back to lap momentarily, before she finds her way up Ann's body.

Her shirt's still open when April returns to her mouth, the taste along her tongue so enthralling that Ann doesn't think and instead simply brings April to lay side-by-side with her on the couch. Ann immediately reaches for the zipper of April's jeans and can't get the prospect of the taste of both their bodies running through a kiss out of her head. 

"I didn't realize perfect Ann 'ten men a week' Perkins wanted to eat me out so bad," April says quickly, holding Ann's hand. 

"I wasn't lying earlier," Ann returns, uncaring about the jab and just wanting to do it. 

"Just kiss me," April requests.

"I can kiss you," Ann says and pops the button of the jeans open, " _and_ fuck you."

Looking down, Ann only catches a glimpse when her hand forces its way underneath the much more colorful underwear. The bump in April's jeans caused by her hand, the idea that her fingers are just barely catching bare flesh, and the slick pressure April folds around her hand turn Ann on even more than she thought it would. Returning to her promise, Ann takes to the half-open mouth caught in a moan. 

The heat of the room and the still mostly clothed April makes sweat bead up on her forehead and fall onto Ann. It's as invigorating as her dreams, but now she can actually taste herself in April's mouth and feel the tuft of hair along her wrist as she fingers April. The pumping, the combined work on her clit, all brings April to a stuttering moan with closed eyes and a halting orgasm.

"Ann," April whines, her voice soft and quiet in a way Ann had never heard before.

That pleading tone, the way she says her name, is everything Ann's wanted. Other than to replace her hand in those pants, that's what she's wanted, and seeing the blissful lidded stare of April only adds to everything. Ann slides her hand out of the underwear glistening and up April's shirt until the clasps are broken. She wants to see April stay like that - serene from coming, calm from closeness - forever, even if the real root of all that is something far from selfless.

Ann stays connected with the younger woman until she's moving her mouth down to April's bare breasts and wondering what she's done to deserve this. Deserting her not long ago and now she has the smaller woman's pert breasts in her mouth and hand. Giving up on something she thought she wanted and now Ann's biting down harder on ridged patches of skin and gooseflesh. 

"I'm so glad you're here," April whines again, her hands on the back of Ann's head until one moves to the bare shoulder of the older woman. 

April's stomach proves too interesting to comment on that, Ann focusing all her efforts on leaving a wet circle around her bellybutton without losing grip on her chest. Moving back up, Ann ignores the overwhelming feeling of those breasts for April's mouth again. 

She broke her promise, no matter how imagined it was, but she still gets to kiss her. Ann still gets to make love to April despite her failures. The thought from her dreams comes back: maybe that's the comfort she can give. If it's what she needs, Ann's more than willing to give everything to her no matter how simple and selfish her own interests may be. No matter the roads they took, if this was the end that would be okay. In the end they were pressed together on those cushions with April's sweat covering both their bodies; they're together with April's come on Ann's fingers, hers in the other girl's mouth. 

The full, passionate kisses stop for a moment. Both out of breath, their foreheads fall together and Ann thinks she could stay like this forever. Even if it meant being almost entirely naked on that couch, the blouse all she's got left, and April shirtless but sadly still in those open jeans that would be just fine by her. Brushing their lips together softly again, April chuckles.

"What?" Ann asks with more than a little worry, already knowing what it was like to have this dream where April just laughs after everything.

"I'm supposed to hate you," April says with a laugh. "I hated you for so long and... look at us."

Ann returns the laugh, their noses bumping together when she leans forward a little. A slight haze is going through her thoughts, the comedown and the drinks mingling in a bad way, but Ann can't stop laughing at everything. Neither can April and it's a sort of beautiful, lilting thing that makes Ann shiver a little and continue laughing in the hopes that she wouldn't stop.

This woman  _was_ supposed to dislike Ann. That was their dynamic - it was their thing - and now Ann's hands are perpetually holding some part of April and the other woman has her hand on Ann's hip. That very same thumb rubs comforting circles on the bone there and Ann just wants April to let her get rid of the interfering denim while they both slowly stop laughing. Tilting her head back up, Ann kisses April once again and lets their lips sit together carefully this time.

Though her hand kneads April's breast a little roughly, Ann wants to put emphasis on the kiss and show her that it isn't just their bodies intertwined that she wants. The rolling thumb runs up to Ann's thighs and that hand cups Ann in lazy closeness while the kiss stays gentle. It's important to her to show April that she doesn't just want April's hand to sit against the crease of her thighs and her puffy, excited lips. 

"I think we gave up on what we're supposed to do a while ago," Ann smiles after breaking the kiss. 

"That's okay too," April's hands are back to Ann's face and it's the most amazing feeling. "I just... I don't know what this is, but I need it."

"Me too," Ann admits. "I don't care what it is, but I need it and I want it too."

"But seriously, you have to admit this is kinda funny," April actually chuckles again and her shy smile returns. 

"I can only imagine what it looks like," Ann smiles and moves in for another wonderful kiss.

"What if Leslie saw us? Or Tom-"

"Oh God, don't say that," Ann laughs mirthlessly, "I think it would actually kill him. The dude wouldn't be able to handle it."

"Yeah," April's face loses some of the humor but Ann ignores it. "It'd still be funny, though."

"You're right," the older woman backs up a small distance and nods, trying not to slide their foreheads around. "I can only imagine what Andy would say."

And there's silence. Total, complete, dead silence when she says his name. It's clear on April's face that she shouldn't have said that, and Ann shakes her head.

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have-"

Just then it's clear that the only way this happened was April trying not to think about Andy - the drinking, the food, Ann being there. Those were all things that were meant to take her mind off of Andy, to provide a little distance, and Ann just screwed that up. So she scoots forward again, getting back into their intimate face-to-face, without demanding a kiss or anything else. 

"It's... fine," April huffs out eventually.

"No, it's not-"

"Stop," April insists with more anger in her voice than there's been in months, Ann notes. "I'm glad you're here, and let's just leave it at that okay?"

"And I just meant I'm glad Andy isn't here..."

The second she says it Ann knows she's said something wrong. It didn't process at all through her brain before coming out her mouth, Ann thanking the wine silently, and April's shifts from anger to horror in a second. Getting up on a knee, April looks like she's trying to find the words but only comes up with half-thoughts. Ann tries to ignore the movement's effect on her breasts, gravity and the shifting all an incredible sight, and instead moves up to a sitting position to try and explain.

"Get out," April says after looking away.

"I didn't-"

"Go," April repeats. 

Ann doesn't stop trying to explain as she throws her clothes on only to be interrupted by April. Just minutes before, when things were better, April wanted her back in and now they're back to square one. Ann knows how fucked up she sounded but no matter how many times she says she's drunk Ann can't seem to get it through to April, whose eyes are watering with each shout. 

It was impossible to think of a worse thing to say, and yet Ann thinks to herself just how bad it was. Maybe something  _was_ broken inside of her because, in all honesty, she was actually still glad that Andy was gone. In the high of closeness and sex Ann could forget that she thought like that just for a little while, but now she's sitting in the foyer trying to explain everything away with a flick of her wrist. April screams at her, though. She screams and there's more than a hint of tears on her face and in her voice.

The slam of the front door is particularly loud, her car noticeably quiet, and her house especially lonely that night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry.


	7. Another Sunny Day

After April leaves them in Leslie's office, Ben tries to initiate a conversation but the look on Leslie's face keeps him from going on. There aren't many jokes that can be told right then, so they sit for a little bit and chew their food without saying much. Some commotion outside the offices perks their interest for a second but nothing holds them.

The next day, at lunch, something catches Leslie's attention and she can't get it out of her head.

"What'd you think she meant? April, I mean; yesterday," Leslie asks suddenly, face scrunched up in concentration. "Or I guess  _who_ is the better way to word that."

"I think it's just nice to see her smiling again," Ben comments with a little smirk that makes Leslie smile. "Obviously I could never say that to her, but it's nice, y'know?"

"She didn't..." Leslie trails off, thinking back to how April confronted them about everything.

It all seemed so abrupt in the moment, but to be honest none of them had seen her in months. Not for very long, anyways. The only person that remotely spends any time with her anymore is Ann, but she probably wouldn't know. The two of them were never very close despite Leslie's best attempts, but maybe that had changed. Leslie smiles to herself and mostly ignores Ben's shaking head and the things he's saying.

"When she's ready she'll be-"

"Ann will know," and Leslie calls before Ben can say anything else.

 

* * *

 

The night that Ann leaves April lets herself go in a way that hasn't happened in weeks. She's gotten good at ignoring everything that used to turn her into a mumbling, crying mess but after Ann - after the evening they shared - all of it hurt so much more. Before it was because she missed him and being around all of it felt like she'd taken it all for granted. Now all the pictures, every bit of clothing and his guitars, all point at her and mock her.

She betrayed him and for what? Nothing. For Ann to say that she was  _glad_ he just wasn't going to walk through that door ever again like April was going to move on completely and entirely in one moment. 

That night, on the couch that still smells like Ann and wine, April balls up and pulls a blanket over her head so she can pretend like she isn't crying. Whatever hope she put into Ann as someone that actually cared was crushed so easily and April wants to rot in that blanket instead of seeing anyone again. It was all a mistake, just like April should have realized. Letting anyone in was always a mistake - Andy was the only one who she let stay. Ann could have been there, but she wasn't.

Ann only made April forget him for a second, and it hurt to think like that. Lying back on the cushions, April's head hits the hard armrest and the shirt Ann took off is still on the floor next to her. It doesn't matter though. The only thing that matters is the bottle of Jack on the counter that April gets up to grab, the dying light outside, and the warmth and comfort of blank, drunken sleep. 

 

* * *

 

Ann's head is in her hands when Leslie calls, sitting in her bedroom and trying to figure her way out of the mess she's created. There wasn't any clear path and Ann knows that, but she wants it so bad to be the easiest thing for April to just forgive her - forgive her like she already did - but the outlook is grim. Her phone gives off that chime that usually made her chuckle and answer immediately but Ann sits back and lets it hang for a second more this time.

Leslie's excited and asks her something that mostly goes over Ann's head. None of the words really ring true because, for the first time in so long, Ann feels completely  _empty_. Before that night, and April letting her back in despite partial abandonment, Ann didn't think anything of her daydreams and fantasies. They were all just delusions of April, that's all. So why, of all things, does Ann hate herself for what she's said?

"...Ann, are you there?" Leslie asks again, or at least Ann thinks she's already asked her that. "Hello-"

"I'm here Leslie," Ann whispers, her voice still a little hoarse from the drive and screaming at herself. 

"What's wrong?" Leslie immediately jumps on the sound of her response. 

"N-Nothing... everything's fine over here," Ann waves around her as if Leslie could see that. 

There's a brief pause where Ann tries to figure out why she doesn't want to do anything other than go back and apologize. Beg for forgiveness if she has to, but as long as April says those three words then Ann doesn't care about anything else. She got what she wanted, after all. April was as perfect as she imagined, and it should have satisfied her. The sad thing about cravings, Ann thinks right as Leslie speaks up again, is getting them out of your system.

"Okay..." Leslie hesitates before resuming her previous inquiries. "I just wanted to ask you if you knew who April was talking about?"

"Sorry, I kinda blanked for a second," Ann shakes her head and tries to figure out what Leslie means. "What did April talk about?"

"She said she felt like she was, y'know, she'd found someone to help move on," Leslie stumbles a few times and Ann's still confused. "She seemed insistent that she found someone-"

Ann hangs up and ignores Leslie's calls and texts after that. She slams her head back into a pillow, rolling another over her face and yelling until her voice is raw. If thinking about April broken because of her was painful, knowing that April confessed something like that to Leslie, and then let Ann in welcoming arms just for her to laugh in April's face, breaks something inside of her. 

Whatever she thought she felt for April before has become something completely different. Maybe lust wasn't the right word anymore, but all Ann wants to do is sob into the pillow and continue screaming at herself for her stupidity. Selfish didn't even begin to describe it, but where was the out? How was she supposed to fix this?

The worst part of that night was realizing that maybe she can't fix it. 

 

* * *

 

On another sunny day, a light breeze and no clouds in the sky, April doesn't bother to call a taxi and does the unthinkable - she walks the few blocks to the cemetery. With her hands firmly in her pocket, the walk gives her time to think about everything. The past few days hit her like a shell shock victim, every second falling into a sequence she just wants to forget. April could deal with Ann, that was fine, but then to feel  _something else_ for the woman just because she was there for her when everyone else kept their distance was something else.

Letting her back in when Ann technically abandoned her felt right to April. She just needed a shoulder, someone to lean on, and Ann gave her that and more. The night, and remembering every curve and inch of Ann makes April shudder with disgust aimed at herself, was perfect. Perfect, like Ann - up until she opened her mouth and said something that April didn't know if she could forgive. 

They both said they wanted it - God, April couldn't forget the taste of Ann and how furious and hungry with desire it made her at the same time - and they let it happen. April let her in, let her come back, just to spend a night with her. It was all in the name of trying to move on, something that April doesn't know she has in her anymore. Thinking that, a car nearly runs into her at a crossing and April doesn't even bother to look at the driver.

_I'm just glad you're here_

That's what April said and the most painful part was the truth in it. She was, for a moment, so happy that someone wanted to be there and acted on that, even if acting on it meant doing everything just to fuck her on the couch it was still something. Wording it like that in her mind, everything seems so simple and black and white but April knows better than that.

No matter Ann's initial intentions, April could feel it in her touch that night and the way they kissed. It felt right, and in some ways April wanted it to be right. All of it makes her sick. April can't disconnect the idea that her life felt a little better for a moment from the assumption that all of this would have broken Andy. Then again, he  _wasn't_ here, and if there was anything he wanted it was to see her happy.

Turning a corner towards the cemetery, seeing the little gate and hanging sign, April sighs to herself. With her head low and thoughts of what she's done - forgiveness, betrayal, and desperate comfort - ring through her head until the little hill comes into focus and the only thing she wants to do is ask him to forgive her. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> NYE party tonight, so won't respond to any possible feedback 'til a bit later. Have a good one and hope your new year is rad as hell!


	8. Demolition Lovers

In the rows of stones April remembers wishing she'd never have to see again, a naive fantasy even then, and looks ahead at the small hill and the little curve he sat against. The sunlight was dizzying almost, but April keeps going until she could just sit and pull her knees closer to her chest. Sitting there, tapping her legs, April tries to figure out what to say. 

On some level she knows this is insane, but she needs it. Talking to some surrogate for Andy was calming when nothing else - no one else, April shivers - could be. She needed it like she thought she wanted Ann, but things were too far gone for that. At this rate, April was never going to see her again. Before she would have been happy about that, happy that someone thought they could get in and then so blatantly refuse to accept that she wasn't okay, but April despises the loneliness. 

"I screwed up," April says to no one, putting her chin on her knees. 

She waits for a response that doesn't come. April sighs and blinks a few times, shaking her head. 

"When I said you were right about Ann, I thought so too," she continues, thankful that nobody ever seemed to stay long in the cemetery. "I kinda... I felt a little more than that, though."

At some point April would have to come to terms with there being no answer to any of these visits. No matter what she tries though, April can't help but speak to a gravestone under a chill breeze and warm rays of the sun. Looking at the little inscription always hurts but April, for once,  _can_ think of something else. Somebody else, to be exact.

"I did something stupid, Andy," she says and can't help but chuckle. "I was... I  _am_ alone. Ann tried to help me and I let her, and stuff happened."

April leans back on her hands and looks up at the sun. It's blinding but something about not having to see for a few seconds, and the black and red spots everywhere, is nice. Ann said she was glad, so damn gleeful, and though she tried to apologize April wouldn't let her. Not then, not in the moment when it all hit her at once what she was doing. Pulled in two directions, like April knew she was, and now she was giving in to one of them.

She gave in to Ann, and it felt so good to just be and feel alive again. Alone, like April always knew and feared she would be, and she just wants to be able to find some ounce of forgiveness there. If anyone could make her feel something again it was Ann, and that was just a fact. April knew it from experience, and thinking that makes her look back to Andy and her face crumples under new sobs. 

A single night, one empty from everything that was haunting her for months, and April can't forget it. To her, it was everything. Ann was someone she was meant to hate and take comfort in because she visited with sleeping pills, not because she missed the way her fingers felt or the curve of her breasts fitting her hands and her mouth neatly. That wasn't how this was supposed to be and it hurts more than April ever thought it would. 

"I'm sorry," she starts. "I'm so sorry."

But April doesn't know who she's saying sorry to. Andy would understand. She might have been saying it to herself for allowing someone to try and fail, just like times so far gone that April thought she'd escaped them. The problem was she was talking to Ann and she was sorry for letting them get to this point. Where April wanted that to be anymore, or what she thought that was to begin with, she doesn't know.

"I shouldn't hate her though, should I?" April says, wiping at her face. "I should just-"

"Hey," a voice interrupts her from behind.

Turning around, Ann's standing there with an unsure half-smile on and with her hands folded. She takes a tentative step forward before thinking better of it and standing just a few feet away from April. April should just yell at her again to make her go away. It had worked so well before, when April was so terrified at the return to the real world where she was alone despite the night, but now she just looks at the other woman and nods. 

Not knowing why she did it, April stands up. She  _should_ sit down and stay in the grass and on the dirt where she belonged. Away from Ann who, despite everything she said and the already repentant look on her face, April  _should_ still hate and avoid. 

"I didn't mean to interrupt you," Ann mumbles and nods over April's shoulder. 

April doesn't say anything and only wonders there for a moment. Loneliness wasn't a one-way street, funnily enough. She realizes that just then, or maybe she always knew it and just didn't want to think about it. Being truly without anyone meant that she had no one to even try. Truth was, she did have someone who tried. She tried and tried again, and she said some terrible things and made some errors, but she was standing in front of April now.

Looking at her then, April wants to break down again but simply can't. Wind picks up and strands of hair from Ann's ponytail flies around her, with the daylight all around her, and through all of it April keeps looking. Hands she wanted and missed squeeze together and April wants to say that she forgives Ann again. Ann's distress after saying it, drunk and high on their bliss, should be enough to let April know but the sincerity behind it scares her.

She doesn't answer Ann who, after standing there uncomfortably, fidgets a little.

"Right, I should probably... leave you alone," Ann mumbles, a little stutter in the last word. 

"No," April says immediately, hating how the word sounds coming from the other woman. "Don't go, please?"

Ann smiles a little and April wonders why it's such a wonderful thing to see. She didn't deny before that Ann was attractive, usually sarcastically and to get a rise out of her, but now she's looking at Ann and missing her smirk, especially against her own lips. Neither of them move an inch, but April already feels a little closer.

"I'm the one who should be sorry, y'know," Ann shrugs but doesn't walk forward. "I don't even know why I said it... well, actually I know why - I was a  _little_ drunk. Either way, I didn't mean it. I didn't mean to say it."

"But you did. You said it and it's out there," April retorts, trying to find any grounds to hate her like she should. "I can't just forget that you thought like that."

"I know, I know. I guess I was just hoping a little," Ann laughs and to April it's maybe the best sound she's heard all day. "I understand if you don't want me around, but I thought I'd let you know that it's more than the other night."

"What's that supposed to mean?" April looks side to side and ends up crossing her arms to at least pretend to be taking offense. 

"It was more than just sex to me. Not like that fixes anything, but... I dunno, honestly," Ann looks up and her lips turn up a little. "I fucked up and I don't want you to think of me like that forever. I was hoping you'd let me off on a high note."

"Why d'you keep trying?" April finally says what's been running through her head the whole time.

It was running through her head sitting there alone, and now with Ann right there she can't think about anything else. The one-sided lonesome soul didn't really exist and Ann could be the person that wanted to break through that. Or, at least, the person that broke through the newly reformed shell and tore down some of those walls that April didn't mind seeing gone. 

"If I stop trying then that means it's really over," Ann looks down and doesn't bother to look return back to April, "and I don't want that. It's not up to me though, so..."

"So?" April says a little colder than she intended. "I mean, what do you want from me?"

"Nothing," and finally the breeze dies off and Ann's nose looks a bit redder from the cold. "I just want you to be better; happy. I thought you were the other night, but I dunno if I can do it."

"D'you really think we can work after something like that?" April turns her head to look back again and it feels so real just then.

The slope that falls down right behind Andy, and Ann right in front of her, makes it reality. That time, something like that, was behind her now. It would always be there, and he'd be gone but he wouldn't have left, and in front of her was something else. Nothing actually changed but April sees Ann a little differently for a moment. Almost like she was letting herself look without a worry over her desires and what she knew she wanted from the nurse.

Grass and frost crunches underneath her feet a little as April walks closer to Ann. 

"I want it to," Ann admits. 

"That's why we can," April says confidently, though she knows there's rising tears in her eyes. 

"What?" Ann asks with a little confusion on her face.

April doesn't answer her directly, only continuing forward until they're almost as close as the night in the den. Instead of kissing her like April wants to, she just takes Ann's hand and looks at her a little pleadingly. Maybe she would notice and act, and in some ways this was the only test left, but April doesn't know if she can say it or do it herself. She can't be alone, or do it alone, so why not see if the trying and the apologies are real? Then she could give her some sense of penance. 

The only noise April hears when Ann kisses her is a rumbling car engine and some indistinct noises of traffic, at least other than the muffled exasperation that melts into a pleased groan in April's mouth. Their hands are clasped tight and squeezes pulse with every second that April feels the warmth of the other woman. It doesn't deepen and they break apart quickly, but April knows what that all means. The heat in her stomach and her cheeks are familiar, and acting on them is just as amazing.

A smile flickers on Ann's face and April lets herself enjoy it this time. Something about the way the light hits her face, and those full lips that April wants to feel all over her body again, is beautiful in a way she didn't know how to process. 

"I should probably explain this to him," April says and turns them around to face Andy's headstone side-by-side with Ann. 

"Um...?" Ann mutters.

"So, yeah, this is what I meant," April lifts their hands up like she's showing them to the stone. "I guess we're... we, or something."

"Uh..." Ann trails off and only when April looks back at her expectantly does she say anything. "Oh yeah, I guess."

"Like, doing it," April nods her head and Ann starts to laugh a little. "I guess I'm gay for Man Perkins."

There was no reason to be dishonest, and they definitely weren't just friends. It felt right though, and standing there holding Ann's hand - and God, the feeling of her thumb across her knuckles triggers an amazing memory of that night - only makes sense to April. 

"Sorry I screwed your wife," Ann shrugs and laughs. 

"I'm not sorry," April says a little seriously, turning to face Ann again. 

"Oh come on, it was a joke," and another smile that April wants to feel against her thighs and on her stomach. 

April makes a noise like she wants to say something but leans forward and kisses her again instead. The only correct thing to do is to keep kissing Ann, hands finally disengaging for the feel of their hips. At some point they were so close that their chests bumped together and April realizes she's wrapped her arms around Ann's neck. 

She can't deny how strange it feels to be in the cemetery and opening up for Ann, but April's thoughts lose focus with the entrance of Ann's tongue. She doesn't have to miss how it feels because Ann's there, and she doesn't have to rely on memories of Ann letting her hand fall down to her ass, so April revels in it. The rough material of April's glove catches a little on the other woman's jacket before her hand sits on Ann's face and gently caresses there. 

The feeling of her cheekbones and the heat and wet desire in her mouth, somewhere April had tasted herself not long ago, sends chills through her that April has to deny in the far too cold air.

"Hey," April says after breaking the kiss.

"Yeah?" Ann asks as her eyes cover every inch of April's face until they fall on her lips and back up to her eyes.

"I want this to work; us," April starts, unsure what to say when all she wants is to get the feeling of Ann's mouth back.

"Me too. Like I said, I want you just as bad," Ann bumps their noses lightly and April laughs at the sensation more than anything, "so I'm willing to do whatever. If I have to apologize every morning and-"

"Shut up and kiss me," April interrupts with a brief smile.

Ann obliges and leans into her with such force that April staggers a bit and ends up leaning backward. The arch is made even more comfortable when Ann lets a hand sit there and keep their bodies close. After a few more moments they stop and April swears she's been smiling the whole time, and it feels so good to do that again. Even if the night would come and bring inevitable sleeplessness and nightmares at least she could stand there with Ann's arms moving up her lower back and sliding down again to comfortably sit on her waist. 

Things might be better if she let Ann keep trying. Turning back to Andy, she wants to say something but nothing feels right. Waving would be something a kid did, and she had no flowers or anything to leave there, so April just smiles. It was the best thing she could do to prove that she had him and his memory always - smiling for him was never hard. It was what he would want.

Walking back to Ann's car, April keeps her arm around the other woman and doesn't bother to remove her hand from sitting on Ann's hips. When it shifts to her ass there isn't any complaint, Ann just chuckling and humming something. Sitting in the passenger seat, April tries to sit with her hands to herself but can't help it when one sits on Ann's thigh for the whole ride. If she could have her way, and when Ann follows her into her house she doesn't have to dream it, then April would stay touching and holding Ann.

At the dining room table, Ann takes out a large container and pops open the lid. The smell of reheated meat fills the air and there's a normalcy there that fills April with a little more comfort. Their arms sit across the table while they eat, April's fingers tapping Ann's knuckles and hands sliding together eventually. It's comfortable, and when they're finished Ann stays to wash the tupperware out. 

Walking over to the sink, April hooks her arms around Ann's waist and leans into her. Pushing her cheek into the back of Ann's head feels better than anything else because April knows it means more than that. It means she's there and April didn't feel the need to make her run off or refuse her begging. Ann turns her head and leaves a light kiss on the corner of April's mouth before returning to finishing the plates. It's all so relaxing because of how plain it feels.

"Do you want me to stay again?" Ann asks when she's finished and sitting in front of her bag. "I don't want to push you, but-"

"Please," April replies without a moment's hesitation.


	9. Something Good Can Work - I

Ann tries not to make it obvious how happy she is that April asked her to stay. It's a little strange, with her car still parked outside and a few of her things sitting on the dining room table, and almost like a tiny slice of what Ann keeps telling herself she wants so she closes her bag with a smile.

"What d'you wanna do then?" Ann asks her, crossing her arms.

April makes a noise, complaining without saying anything, and puts her hand on Ann's arm, fingers pushing through them until she breaks apart and takes Ann's hand. The past hour or so she's been refusing to let go of Ann, all the way from the cemetery to her house. 

Just that little touch sets a burst of heat off throughout Ann and it's different. It's been different ever since she sat down and actually thought about April after blindly admitting how happy she was that Andy wasn't around to stop her from getting to April. It wasn't like she usually thought of April, naked and practically inhuman, and with a questioning intent. Ann still couldn't really pinpoint if what she felt was more than just lust, but she was willing to try if it meant April kept looking at her the way she was - eyes darting for hers, hand gripping tight, and rolling her lips.

"We can just sit here, or watch TV, or read..." April trails, listing things off with her finger on Ann's palm. "I dunno, but I just want you to be here."

"That sounds great," Ann smiles, leading her to the couch and sitting down.

Over the course of an hour, both of them get tired of the stack of books April brings out and end up turning on the TV. While they read April sat with her back to Ann's shoulder, awkwardly keeping contact all the while. At one point she leaned her head back on Ann's shoulder and looked up expectantly, a small curve of her lips asking a question. Without saying anything Ann kissed her from the strange position before they returned to sitting there in the quiet.

Now Ann's staring at something on the TV but she can't really make anything out because April falls on her back and rests her head in the older woman's lap. Looking down, April stares back up at her and there's something in her eyes that catches Ann off guard for a moment. It's not the same kind of look that she's known before, either loathing or in one case desire, but Ann has to look away because her chest is ready to burst. So she keeps half-watching the news or C-SPAN or whatever it was that was on, April turning her head to follow Ann's eyes while the other woman played with her hair.

"Do you wanna talk about it?" April asks her suddenly, interrupting Ann's brief reverie. 

"What?" she asks a little dumbly, unsure what the prone woman wants.

"You acted weird when I was talking to..." April sighs, "to Andy."

"You don't have to explain that."

"It's crazy, I know-"

"No, it's really, um, sweet," Ann struggles to find the word to describe it. "I mean, I understand why you do it. I can't blame you, either."

"It just helps sometimes. Sometimes it feels like I'm actually-"

"April," Ann says slowly because she can hear shaky breaths and April's hand going for hers not tangled in hair. 

"I don't wanna forget anything but it sucks, y'know?" April explains with a calmer voice. "I'll still keep going, if that's cool."

"Dude, I'm not gonna make you stop," Ann chuckles and she can feel April smile against her thigh. "I'll go too."

"Yeah?" April leans on her hand and looks up at Ann.

"Totally," and Ann leans in for a kiss and April's still got that faint flicker of a smile.

The younger woman returns to her lap, letting go of her hand to rest one on Ann's leg and tap absentmindedly. It's comfortable for a little while until Ann has to shift around and April takes that as a hint to move. Without saying a word, Ann just moves her hand back to her leg and gives her the sort of half-smile that asks for April to go back without saying anything. Back to C-SPAN and lounging for the afternoon, Ann thinks, and it can't be any better.

Relaxed breaths soon come out of the resting figure, April eventually nodding off in her lap. Soft snores come out and Ann chuckles to herself because she can't get over how peaceful, and how stupidly cute, she looks like this. Instead of waking her Ann continues the idle motions of combing through April's hair and trying to ignore that the woman she's craving has her head in her lap. 

Ann turns off the TV and finds a better position for her back without waking the sleeping woman. Closing her eyes, taking in the feeling of April's soft hair through her fingers, Ann finds some sleep for herself.

 

 

* * *

 

 

A weight shifts off of her lap and Ann slowly shakes herself awake. It's gotten cold in the house and the sun's set, low color and light spilling through the small living room, and when she opens her eyes April's standing up and stretching. It feels less creepy, at least less awkward than when she did it occasionally in City Hall, when she watches the way April's shirt rides up her back and a little bit of skin's clearly visible. She can't keep her eyes off of the curve of April's back and her lower back as it slopes down to meet the edge of her pants, her ass flexed and perfect for Ann's hands, until she turns around.

Clearly noticing her watching, April looks down and chuckles. Ann returns the awkward laugh but doesn't stop looking at April. When the other woman eventually does look back up an exchange of glances passes and Ann's face and body heat up simultaneously. 

"We should probably actually go to sleep," April hurries to say, squatting down to pull off the cushions on the couch. "Move. Since you're here, may as well use this stupid thing."

"You never pulled this out... the last few months?" Ann stills with her hand on the cushion, pulling off and silently berating herself for bringing any of that up. 

"Never had a reason to," April mumbles as the couch folds out. "There."

"Perfect," Ann smiles and kisses April's cheek, trying to find a simple way to apologize without mentioning the past months again. 

Ann knows not to say anything about the bedroom. Sometimes she was a little oblivious of the things April was going through, obviously, but that wasn't something that needed explaining. So Ann flops down on the makeshift bed as April rifles through a basket behind the couch she'd seen earlier, producing a blanket and tossing it at Ann. 

Picking up the pillow that sat on the couch's armrest, Ann pushes it all the way back and tries to figure out a spot to lay back in. Dissatisfied, Ann sits up and unhooks her bra, pulling it through her shirt and tossing it on the floor. A zipper sounds out loudly and Ann can't help but look up at April bending over and pulling off her jeans. She can't make out much in the dark, but April's bare legs are hard to miss and the outline of panties against her thighs is a mesmerizing sight. She stares all the way from where she stands to when April does the same to her own bra, Ann watching it fall, and sits on the foldout couch and pulls a bit of the blanket over herself. 

"Stop staring, pervert," April says with a wry smile. 

"Kinda hard," Ann mutters, chuckling. 

"Good," April returns, leaving a light kiss and pushing Ann onto her side.

April curls into her back, her head resting on Ann's shoulder, and arms wrap around her waist until they hold hands and all that cold disappears in an instant. Sleep isn't very hard to find in the night like this. At least then, asleep, she can forget that April's nuzzling her back and what that's doing to her.

"G'night Ann," and it's barely under her breath. 

"Yeah, you too," she turns her head and April meets her over the shoulder.

At least kissing her was gentle, in place of everything else Ann wanted. Thankfully she doesn't say that she loves her like the last time. This time April's awake, just barely, and not drunk. At least she can sleep, and thinking about it at least  _April_ could sleep like this - with someone. They weren't alone.

 

 

* * *

 

 

A grinding along her back wakes her. April's hands lowered on her body throughout the night, or just then, and the tips of fingers are playing at skin under her own underwear. They're sliding in and out of the edge of the panties, April's nails digging into her and Ann lets a quiet moan escape, eyes still shut and still sleepy. April makes a noise in response, somewhere between a laugh and a groan, but doesn't fully commit with her fingers yet.

"Too early?" April says quietly into her back, lips falling on her through the shirt. 

"Never too early," Ann responds and feels April's mouth turn up into a grin as she trails down her back. 

Fingers dig a little deeper into the panties and April's hand takes no time to moving in consistent circles across Ann's lips. Ann starts to laugh at how eager her hand is, moving her flattened fingers in a circular pattern, but that pattern takes its toll on her and she can't help but eke out moans and groans. It's seconds before she comes from that, April's mouth moving through the shirt and her other hand pushing on Ann's stomach and riding up her shirt. 

"You're so easy, Perkins," April says into her back, fingers stilled in her panties sadly. "I could make you come just by breathing on you."

"Probably," Ann laughs, touching April's elbow and pushing her hand further down. "Maybe we'll try it."

"Maybe," April dips a finger into her pussy while talking. "First I wanna hear you moan for me again."

It doesn't take long for her request to come to fruition, April's middle finger pumping slowly for a few moments and continually finding her deeper and deeper. First it was just short movements, then down to her first knuckle where she crooks her finger and thrusts quickly again, and Ann loses it at the second knuckle. It's louder this time, Ann feeling almost nothing other than that finger and April's hips pushing into her back. The wetness there is impossible to ignore and Ann lets out another squeal as her body finds a perfect, spacy bliss. 

April doesn't leave her this time, idly playing and pressing into her every few moments while she kisses Ann's shoulder. Eventually Ann turns her head and their lips catch, April's tongue immediately finding hers, and they stay like that for a little while. It's less desperate and heated as the first time, but Ann's too high on tightly spaced orgasms to care at all.

"Good?" 

"Dumbest question ever, April," Ann sighs.

But April doesn't let up, her hand pressing in with intent once again. With her back against April's lips constantly, Ann could keep coming over and over again without a problem. There were so many nights of her own hand, imagining this very thing, that April spreading her open with index and middle fingers in conjunction with her lips moving up to her neck it doesn't matter. April pushes her chest into her again, and the feeling of her nipples hard through the shirt sets Ann off again.

"Tell me what you want," April says quietly into her ear, their bodies so close.

"You," Ann groans, April's hand mesmerizing. "I want... you. Make me come, April. Again and again."

It's not much, just plain vertical movements up and down Ann's labia with the grinding of April's chest, and laughing a little with Ann's request, but it's more than Ann could ever imagine before. Even if she's actually just asleep in reality, and it's all a dream, this dream is so damn good that she just gives in. Peppered kisses on her neck move to suckling and April's putting bruises all over her neck but it doesn't matter because her fingers are speeding their motions up, her palm giving amazing sliding friction to Ann's clit at the same time, and Ann tries to prolong it.

Everything about that moment is amazing. She's sleeping with April pressed up to her back, half naked and sucking on her neck and shoulder blades, while the woman continually fucks her with a hand. The thought, and that utterly perfect combination of palm and fingers, brings her to a standstill on that foldout couch. 

"C'mon Ann, come for me," April hisses into her neck, her hand moving even faster.

"Oh fuck, please..." Ann whispers, almost burning from the intense, chest-rattling orgasm. 

"Come for me," April responds, slowing down in turn with Ann's breaths. "You want it so bad, I know. Let it happen."

Her free hand falls on Ann's breast, finding a nipple and pinching down hard, and it brings everything into focus for a second before the surroundings melt into a whine and her muscles tightening and finding total relaxation all at once. April's fingers are dripping when they move up her stomach to sit against her chin and then move to her bottom lip. Ann lets her put them against her own mouth and takes the digits in without a second thought. Letting her tongue run along the sweetly acrid finger, Ann sucks as much of herself off of those fingers as she can stand before it's all too much again and she begs to come once more.

Eventually April pulls out of her mouth, her finger slick for an entirely different reason this time. Ann doesn't even know why that's hotter than any other part of the late night - what time was it, she thinks to herself suddenly uncaring and hoping April would just put her hands back where they belonged - and she doesn't hesitate to kiss the tips of her fingers. April laughs a little and taps Ann's chin with a wet finger.

"I think you still owe me," April says, turning Ann around and pressing her now obviously soaked center into Ann's thigh and the edge of her panties.

"Yeah?" Ann just says something to make any noise because they're disastrously close.

April runs a hand along Ann's thigh and keeps the back of her hand there, rubbing knuckles against her. Ann can only keep her hands feathering April's hair and running along her cheek, trying to ignore how turned on April so clearly is and how they're pressed into each other. Without another word April moves her hand to the back of Ann's head and rolls onto her back. Pushing her down, more as a suggestion than with much force, Ann eagerly moves down April's stomach. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> With the return of No One Like You to its normal schedule this week, I'll be putting this story on the Saturday timeslot for my weekly schedule from now on. Sadly that means less rapid-fire posting like the last two weeks, but hopefully you'll stick around anyways.
> 
> And with that, Part Two is this coming Saturday ;)


	10. Something Good Can Work - II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Continuation of the last chapter, because I wanted to avoid 4k+ chapters in this fic. Or something. I dunno.
> 
> Enjoy, and see you next Saturday.

"I don't care if I have to apologize every morning, April," Ann hums along her skin, each bit she mouths just as perfect as the rest, "this is all I want."

"Yeah? What d'you want?" April asks her, and when Ann looks up she's closing her eyes and biting her bottom lip. 

Ann can only give a small, dark chuckle in response. The way her stomach feels under mouth, April's breaths fluttering, is telling enough. Ann looks up her body, trying to ignore the expectant, already heavy breaths and April's eyes boring down into her once again. Feeling like she has something to do, she has to  _perform_ , Ann mumbles something into April's chest before letting her lips trail against the edge of her underwear again.

This is exactly what she's wanted - to feel that heat radiating into her, April's smell going through her and the taste just inches away. Ann can't help but smile when her hands reach beneath the panties, fingering the sides, and April groans.

"April, you are... perfect," Ann mutters, kissing the skin that's exposing itself as she pulls the fabric from April. "So beautiful."

April sounds like she's going to say something else in response, but when she's free and Ann's staring her down there's nothing between the two of them. She kisses April's clit tenderly, a sharp noise coming out of her, and Ann doesn't stop to let her mouth catch every inch of her she can. The taste of her pussy is an extravagant pleasure that Ann didn't know before, so she enjoys the trembling underneath her with ever movement of her own lips.

The same, stuttering breaths from before that Ann memorized come out just then, when April's clit is between her teeth, and she smiles into her. The wetness trailing down her lips and onto her chin, and  _God,_ Ann thinks, she's literally dripping when she spreads her open with fingers, is driving Ann insane.

Still, she lets lazy movements of her lips take precedence all over her. Running along her entirely, from clit to nearer the sheet on the couch, Ann loves to bring out those moans. April's voice shattering around her, like she's forgetting everything and giving in to just them, is the perfect soundtrack to this night. Not wanting to give her too much too quick, or let her experience just one orgasm, Ann moves her hands to April's thighs, knuckles brushing down to her center and pulling back to the outside of her legs and repeating it all over again.

"Does this... is this what you want?" Ann presses a finger inside and lets April whine loudly underneath her.

"Yes, yes," April repeats quickly. "I want it."

"Do you need it?" she pumps once, burying her with a finger. 

"I need it; you, I need you Ann," April whimpers and Ann continues pumping and returning to kissing and gently sucking her.

It does taste just as amazing as Ann imagined, and when she looks up again April is caught in her first orgasm. Her nipples are showing clearly through the thin shirt and Ann just ignores all of that for the feeling of a quivering, shaky April under her hands and her mouth. Again, sucking down her lips is just another step towards feeling her come all over once more. 

She laps up greedily again, repeating the strokes of her tongue and keeping the steady, consistent rhythm as April's breaths hitch and her breasts rise and fall erratically. Slipping another finger inside is so easy, April letting them both slide in without any effort and just moaning in response, until Ann's combining her efforts. Another beautiful yelp comes out and April calms her breathing as Ann slows down and pulls her fingers away. 

She must think they've stopped because April pulls her up to kiss, but Ann gives her that. There are other plans in mind, but April's got the blanket in her fists and won't stop nibbling on Ann's bottom lip. They roll onto their sides and Ann's thigh meets April's lips and she hears a brief shudder again. Ignoring that, they continue with the lashes of tongue and Ann's mouth starting to hurt from April's advances. Eventually Ann lets her hand fall to April again and watches the younger woman look down her body and watch Ann let her fingers find entrance once again.

There isn't much affair when she comes that time, April just pushing their chests closer and letting her head fall into Ann's neck. There's another loud, pleasured yell that tells Ann to slow down and let her ride out the orgasm on her finger. 

"Tell me how bad you wanna come for me, baby," Ann says softly, like she's there solely for April. That was clearly a lie, but neither of them had to believe or know that.

"If you don't go down on me again I'll scream," April warns her and looks back into Ann's eyes, pushing her onto her back. 

"Who says I don't want you to scream for me?" Ann crooks her eyebrow and watches April sit on her chest and buck slightly there.

"Maybe we'll try that too," April says before she's scooting closer and closer to Ann's mouth. "Just fucking do it, Ann."

"What?" she teases, grabbing April's bare ass and moving her by the flesh there to sit against her face.

"Eat me out, you les- ah... oh, _shit,_ " and April's request melts into a long, hanging moan when Ann meets her pussy and the full weight of April is pressing her entirely into Ann's mouth. 

"I could taste you all night April," Ann tells her, moving away just for an instant but still getting an angry whine in response. "Calm down, I'm not done yet..."

Ann swipes at her clit with her tongue, reaching up a bit, before April joins Ann's mouth moving against her lips. With her hand sitting there, the pressure against her nub sending vibrations through April that Ann herself can feel, Ann takes the chance to let her tongue press quickly into her. With a strange angle Ann looks up as her tongue finds the depths of April, tasting her all along just like Ann's wanted for so long, and watches the woman lean back slightly and put her free hand in her hair.

April's eyes are closed shut and she's tilted her head back in total bliss with the next orgasm, riding along Ann's tongue until there's a little bit for Ann to taste and swirl in her mouth. Swallowing April is amazing and continue her tiring thrusts with her tongue is getting better and better with the expectation of that slight spread of fluid as April came. Squeezing April's ass hard as she came, there's another shudder and April nearly yells out into the small house. Though she's loud, there's still a softness there that Ann loves - the early morning and April's come swirling together perfectly.

April rides her mouth for a little bit longer and watching her do it is maybe the hottest thing to Ann. Watching the woman buck unevenly and slowly into Ann's mouth is driving her insane but April eventually falls back onto the couch and makes small, low noises. Turning to her, Ann kisses her thigh and looks up. April's staring down at her with attentive, loving eyes that Ann only dreamed of.

"You really are beautiful, Ann," April says calmly, her eyes blank with met desire. "I never tell you that, do I?"

"There wasn't much reason to before," Ann says and regrets her choice of words but April only smiles weakly. "You're the-"

"I could stare into your eyes all night, and you've got the kind of smile that makes me feel like I can be better," April continues, ignoring Ann's words and there's still that loving look. "I could talk about the rest of your body for days, but I'd rather feel it and taste it. You're just... you make me feel a bit better."

"April," Ann starts, moving so that they're lined up and April's still watching her, "you don't have to say anything."

"I know, but I want to," April rests her hand against Ann's cheek and that calm, blissful look makes Ann smile. "I want you to know that I need you here. You're... I think something good can work here."

"I want it to," Ann replies immediately, kissing April without any force and just needing the feeling again. "I'll apologize every  _single day_ -"

"Shut up, just... be here," April smiles softly and keeps her hand on Ann's face. "That's good enough for me."

There aren't words that make sense to Ann there, so she just kisses her again and again. Their bodies are pressed together and Ann doesn't dare move when April brings covers over them, underwear forgotten on the floor and their legs intertwining in the dark. Underneath the sheets their hands meet and Ann holds onto her, enjoying the comfortable closeness of just being next to April. Sure, next to her meant that they were nearly touching and April's thigh dug into her pussy but that was the kind of proximity that Ann wants.

It was so close they were almost merged together and Ann's okay with that. She's definitely when April starts moving a little and the shifting weight makes her moan again. April makes a brief return down her legs, spreading them open and putting her mouth against her but Ann can barely come even with her lover's mouth. The fantastic pressure of her tongue against her clit is just that, but Ann's wiped out by this point.

Still she wants to come for April. It's the only thing she can think to do, and the hand squeezing her breast under the shirt begs her to release and let go so Ann tries her best to let that sweeping relaxation take over again. April kisses her all the way back to her mouth - a peck on her lips, a suck on her clit that turns into a gentle press, riding along her belly with wet dragging, and then between her breasts before making a detour to her nipple. 

Ann moans softly and April continues sucking through her shirt. She bunches up the shirt slowly until Ann's totally naked and the bare, rigid skin there is fully enveloped in April's mouth. That simple action, and April's leg pushed back close to her again, combined with April's hand searching her thighs and reaching around to return the squeeze around Ann's ass is too much. It's a soft orgasm, like it's pulled to the surface with a helping hand, and it's damnably pleasant that she doesn't think of how hot it is. Ann's just happy to come for April this easily, pressed into her leg and with a mouth on her breast.

Returning to her lips, April stops and smiles. 

"You  _are_ so easy," she says with that grin on. "I love it."

"I can barely think right now, so let's not talk about what we love," Ann says with a laugh and watches April's face shift to confusion and then stop altogether.

"Yeah, let's not do that," she agrees but doesn't turn away, instead kissing Ann again.

They stay like that, continually moving against one another and kissing softly until April eventually nods off as late as an hour or two later. Ann follows suit, her mind not comprehending that the last hour or so was the best sex of her life and April looks just as beat and happy. She looks  _happy_.

That's the last thought Ann has as she falls asleep: April's happy again. 

 

 

* * *

 

 

In the morning, April wakes to the smell of something cooking. When she sits up she's still just wearing her shirt but doesn't care. Standing up, she crosses over to the kitchen and sees Ann standing there in just her underwear. She's putting something on plates and it smells so heavenly that the only comparison was Ann.

Last night, and Ann. She breathes through her nose and takes in the eggs in the morning as her mind races to remember every inch of Ann's body the night before. It was incredible, watching Ann go down on her continuously and even force her to sit and ride her through an orgasm. It was amazing, and watching Ann turn around and look down while biting her lip, setting the plate down and never taking her eyes off of April, is almost as good.

But she can't let Ann off this easily. There's no way she's gonna let this mostly prim and proper older woman stare down at the crease between her thighs longingly without saying a word. It'd be too easy, anyways. 

"What, never seen another girl naked before? Or haven't you seen a girl you fucked the day after?" she says with a slight tinge of sarcasm that even she's missing. "I'm surprised. I thought you were, like, crazy gay or something."

"I'm not the one who admitted she's gay for me," Ann returns just as evenly. 

"You're the lesbo, not me," April says with a smirk on.

"Aw, really? I coulda sworn you're the one who woke me up just to finger me," and Ann leans forward to kiss her. 

"Maybe," April takes a bite of the eggs and they're actually kind of terrible somehow.

"Are they good?" and there's a sincere hope in Ann's voice. "I told you I'm terrible-"

"They're perfect," April says slowly, understanding this isn't about the still kind of raw scramble. "Thanks for staying."

April's sitting at her dining table naked, eating breakfast with Ann, and suddenly it's hilarious. Walking back to her clothes, feeling a little ridiculous and chuckling, she slips on her underwear and throws Ann a shirt. There's almost a sad look, at least after the staring when April bent over to pick up the clothing, but Ann smiles that same bright curl of her lips that used to make April mad. It usually made her fume at how perfect and happy she could be while still leading a pretty fucked up life.

Now it just makes April smile in return, going back to the breakfast and then to kissing her. It felt right, all of it, and April doesn't question anything or the illusion might break.

 


	11. Where Were We on the Weekend

Ann watches April stand up with the plate of uneaten eggs, and she knows they're undercooked because Ann can't even figure that out, but the way that she tries to hide the fact she's throwing them away is maybe enough. When she walks back across the kitchen, April sits in her lap and hooks her arms around her neck as Ann sits there. 

Neither of them ask a word of the other, and it's nice. It's calm. Relaxing, just like April's wrists locked above her shoulders. Sitting there in the morning, daybreak's light peeking through the window and all over them, with her hand gently touching April's thigh makes Ann feel at peace. She can't help but stare at light pushing through strands of hair and, when she pushes a bit back over April's ear, the way she smiles and how the sun makes that so much better.

"You really like to watch, don't you? Creep," April interrupts her silent staring with a smirk. 

"You just... you're beautiful," Ann doesn't care how the old April would sigh and lambaste her for saying something like that because she's gotten too used to being open with her now. "I dunno, I don't wanna look away."

"Well, I'm gonna go get some clothes," April stood up, sadly, and walked over to the den before turning around and catching Ann's attention with a snap of her fingers.

"What, sorry?" Ann turns and April's got that same sly curve to her lips.

"I didn't say look away," she half-sings and walks to a basket.

So Ann doesn't. When April undresses in front of her, Ann's watching the whole time - watching April bend down knowingly to rifle through a basket, the small and blue panties from the night before, the ones Ann couldn't really make out, barely keeping her contained - and she doesn't stop even when April catches her eyes. She takes her shirt off and Ann just rolls her lips. Slipping into a new pair of plain whites Ann pays close attention to April shaking the old pair off of her legs and looking up at her.

April just snaps the waist on her hips and goes back to dressing, Ann's mouth watering. When she walks back into the dining room she isn't wearing a shirt and she's only got that pair of thin, nearly transparent panties on. It's hopeless to think that she isn't wondering what April tastes like in the morning, so Ann doesn't bother. She just stands up and kisses April quietly, without as much need as before, and enjoys the slow press of their lips and bodies.

When she pushes April back into the small table, Ann breaks apart and smiles. They separate and April picks up a shirt on the kitchen counter, throwing it on without bothering with a bra. 

"Don't you have to work today?" April asks her, genuinely curious as she sits up on the counter.

"No, I took a lot of shift cuts," Ann says without really thinking, only watching April's legs spreading and her feet kicking the cabinet doors. "I've still got a lot of on-call duties, but I don't really go in on the weekends anymore." 

"It's the weekend? Oh," April laughs a somber, little thing that Ann smiles at reflexively, "I guess I lost concept of a week. No work kinda does that to ya."

"Speaking of, when are you going back?" Ann's already angry that she's asking that question, but they're getting softer and more comfortable with each other. She has to know when April will return to  _April_. "Sorry, I didn't mean-"

"No, it's fine... just haven't thought about it," she bounces back and forth on the counter until she hops down. "I said I'd get better. I promised you that."

"And I'll be here, every step of the way," Ann walks forward and threads her fingers through April's, "up until you're better. I don't care if you're done with me after that, just-"

"You're such a drama queen," April laughs and kisses her, shutting her up with her lips until they're both standing there.

It must have only been half a minute or so, but Ann wants it to last forever. Bathing in warm sunlight, April's wet tongue darting inside her mouth, and the feeling of her hands being able to go to April's nearly bare breast and hold her gently is almost too much. It has to be forever, but Ann knows it won't be. Still, she's going to enjoy it.

When they stop she's still rubbing soft, small circles on April's nipple and watching her eyes go shut and her mouth hang ever so slightly open. Ann stops and those eyes burst open immediately, yet neither of them do anything. All the words and kisses have been spoken for, and Ann's just happy that they get to be like this. Maybe that's why she's okay with helping April, out of some selfish realization that her own needs are fulfilled and she can move on to this fragile woman's. 

"Hey, why don't you go get changed?" April bites her lip and nods her head to the pile of clothes she was just rummaging through. "I'm sure I've got something that can fit your mature, overweight physique."

"Very funny," Ann smiles and April follows suit, still watching Ann. "I need a shower first."

April's eyes light up at the word.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Seeing April naked is one thing, Ann notes. The way her stomach fluttered under her fingers, the tips trailing down to meet her wet and already begging for her, and the curve of her ass are all spectacular. April's eyes following hers all the way along her, from breast to hip, is great.

Watching April soaked in water, all over, and the tiny streams across her collar and dipping through the valley between her breasts, is  _somehow_ better. April's back is pushed up into Ann, her ass meeting her thigh, and Ann already forgot about the shower altogether. The only thing that matters is April loudly moaning in the shower, Ann's fingers pressing into her and forcing out an orgasm in the morning.

"C'mon, baby," Ann says quietly into her ear, biting her a little and moving to the side of her neck as water runs over their bodies intermingled. "I know you can come again for me. You'll do it for me?"

"Oh God, yes," April sighs back to her, arching her back so that Ann's fingers press in naturally. 

"That's what I like to hear," Ann trails her mouth down to April's shoulder and sucks hard there. She wants April to have the same hickey that Ann's got on her, just above her shoulder blade but not quite her back. "Tell me you want it." 

"I want you, Ann. Make me come," April's shoulder bruises up with the sucking and nibbling until Ann's satisfied and refocuses on squeezing her breast and fingering her roughly. "Faster. Faster, oh... Ann.  _Ann_."

Her voice reaches an epic pitch, all high and needy, until she's nearly squealing through the running water. Ann's mouth is open, too, pressed against the sheer, wet wall of hair and her fingers in a loosening April as she re-folds around Ann's finger and comes with another great moan. April's breaths are a little shaky and it might just be the best part of watching her like this. 

Pulling out of April, Ann sucks her off her fingers like she'd done for herself the night prior. April watches over her shoulder and groans, catching her lips and kissing her harshly. April turns around until they're pressed up against each other and April's foot is sliding up her shin. The running water's still nice and hot, steam rising off of their bodies, but Ann can clearly distinguish the water from April's natural wetness and arousal. Mostly from taste, and experience now, but it feels perfect against her leg.

"Was that good for you?" Ann asks her, the showerhead so loud in her ears she isn't sure April heard her.

"God, yes," April bucks her hips into Ann's leg and mumbles something before she's getting to her knees in the shower. 

"Please," Ann whispers as April hovers over her pussy, her mouth hanging open.

April doesn't give it a moment, quickly latching onto her. A hand runs up her thigh and another's gripping her waist hard, Ann's hipbone the leverage for April as she sucked against her clit. The younger woman bends her head further down to capture all of Ann into her mouth, puffy and excited lips sucked on until Ann's sure her head will burst, before she returns to that wonderful pressure in her center. The hand set on her inner thigh spreads her apart playfully several times, gesturing at entrance but never committing.

It drives her insane, and Ann loves it. April's fingers slip in eventually, immediately going to two fingers fucking her slowly, and it's a perfect rhythmic combination of her mouth giving harsh pressure on her clit and the fingers sliding in out with a slick ease. 

She comes again, and again, and again. Over and over, Ann can't even think for a moment before she comes again. She's sure that it's impossible for someone to feel pleasure like this - hot water hitting her breasts, nipples gladly taking that action, and the kneeling woman getting her off with her mouth endlessly. Seemingly endlessly, because Ann loses concept of time with April's mouth touching her. It's almost surreal, like she's having an out of body experience, until the next orgasm hits.

Then Ann's well aware she's in her body, hand on top of April's head and pushing her pussy into the woman's mouth with thrusts. This can't  _ever_ let up. It does, though, and April stands up to kiss her after six or seven, Ann isn't sure, shaking orgasms.

"I could do that all day," April says softly when they break apart, their mouths still touching. 

"I kinda want you to," Ann smiles and April gives a much brighter laugh that time, kissing her once. 

"Enjoying your shower?" she presses herself closer to April and hopes that's a good enough answer, because all she wants to do is feel their tongues against each other, their tastes mingling. 

Then April lathers her hand in soap and strokes Ann's side. She moves to let the water run down the suds there and April applies the soap elsewhere, all over. Soon she's covered and washing off the suds in succession, April's hand going across her whole body. April's tilting her head and looking up to watch Ann, her hands idly moving over parts of her body that she's already well acquainted with. This is different. It's not sex, it's not even meant as anything like that, but it's comfortable in that shower with April washing her.

They're kissing intermittently but more importantly their hands are always touching the other person, Ann getting the picture and doing the same for April. She turns around and pulls her hair over her shoulder, looking at Ann, and smiles openly when she rubs her back and soap falls all the way down her. Eventually Ann finds a bottle and pours out a fragrant dollop and rubs it into soft white fluff in April's hair and she looks absolutely ridiculous.

Likewise, April runs her hand through Ann's hair and coats her in shampoo. Some gets in her eye and Ann just laughs while squinting, a little bit of pain shooting through her.

"Sorry," April whispers and leans up on her feet to kiss her cheek near the corner of her eye. "Better?"

Ann just gives her a look like she's never seen this side of April before. To be fair, she hasn't. April acting like that to her is, strangely, amazing. "Yeah, it's better," she says back.

Eventually they sit down in the large tub, Ann in April's naked lap, as the younger woman combs through her hair and the water rushes over them. Their fingers are all pruning and wrinkly, and Ann's lips hurt from kissing so much, so they do find their way out with desensitized, hot skin.

It's nice to walk out of the shower some absurd time after they stepped in, clean and happy, just to share a towel as they wrapped themselves together in it. Laughing a little, they roll back and forth in the towel surrounding them. Ann smiles softly and April beams at her in response, and that erases whatever selfish doubts Ann might have. They watch each other dress, their hair still dripping water and covering their shirts in wet spots, before they leave the bathroom together.

It's relaxing; it's their weekend.

 

 

* * *

 

 

"You don't have to go," Ann strokes her cheek as they sit parked outside of City Hall.

"I think I should... I think I gotta go back," April sighs heavily and looks back at her. "It's a good first step."

"It's a great first step," Ann agrees and kisses the corner of her mouth.

April smiles and takes a breath before putting her hand on the car door. Another breath and she closes her eyes, remembering that she can do this. She can do this. "Thanks, Ann," she looks over to the other woman and Ann's smiling back at her. "Do you think...?"

"Yeah," Ann interrupts her and pulls around to a public parking lot, stopping there. "I'll go in with you." 

She can't figure out the words to say, none of them really fitting that moment, so April just smiles again. A first step. Their first step? Maybe, but nonetheless they walk out of the car hand-in-hand, the entrance to City Hall feeling less like a deathtrap as it did when April returned before. This time Ann squeezes her hand and gives her a reassuring look when they round the corner to hallway with the Parks department doors.

She leaves with a kiss on April's cheek and that, that little gesture and Ann's short wave, helps her get through those double-doors. 


	12. Time to Pretend

Ann spends the whole day, every second, feeling so good about herself and everything she's done that it hits her how incredibly pathetic all of that is. Not that she was ever a perfect, morally upstanding person in reality but she didn't expect to ever think that she deserves to feel this happy for doing something nice. It was that the thought that April was content, and moving forward, only came after minutes of praising herself.

When she gets a little text from April saying that she got her job back, Ann returns it with an overwhelming number of emoticons and excitement. She can be happy about that, and about seeing April's texts around lunch and throughout the day saying how boring work is. There's never a word about breaking down or needing a drive back, and it's honestly comforting knowing that April feels safe at work.

Driving back to City Hall to pick her up, Ann waves to her and watches April walk over to the car and get in slowly. The hours of being out of the house, sitting in public, and working make her look exhausted and she's still breathtaking at the same time. Maybe it's because she smiles when she sits in the passenger seat, or that she immediately kisses Ann.

But she tastes so painfully like whiskey that Ann almost reels back.

"Hey," April greets with a quiet voice, "let's go home. I'm so tired."

"Yeah? How was... work?" Ann asks her, still rolling that taste around in her mouth. 

April just smiles and nods slowly before she talks. "It's nice to be back," she takes another look at City Hall as Ann drives away.

"Anything different about the place?" Ann tries, hoping that April will tell her she's drinking.

"Nope," she says after thinking for a moment, that smile still there. "C'mon, I wanna get out of this stupid dress."

"What, you look great," Ann says absentmindedly, forgetting the issue at hand because she does look great in that shade of blue, and the tiny little white dots sprinkled all over it fit her for some reason.

"Yeah, you told me that this morning," April sighs but she's still got a vague smile, "and then again when I sent you the first picture back at work."

"You do," Ann returns, half-paying attention to the traffic around her. 

They're silent for a little while, April's hand moving over silently to sit on Ann's inner thigh. She kneads the flesh of her leg a little, muscles taut in response, but there's no sudden stop at the side of the road or incredibly difficult car ride. Instead Ann drives them directly to her own house where she has to grab a few things, just a few days worth of her own clothes when she got tired of wearing April's things. 

She gets out of the car with a kiss on April's cheek and when she comes back with a small basket, Ann can see April take a sip from a small flask and quickly put it back in her purse. April didn't seem to notice her walking up, so she just put her things in the back seats and when they were driving back to April's house she accepted the hand back in her lap. 

It played at her skirt and rode up her legs a bit, but only sat squeezing her hip and thighs. April's hand sat against panties, rubbing a finger along the fabric against her hip bone slowly, until they made it to April's house. Ann's things sit neatly behind the couch, and when they're both settled a bit it's only a few minutes before April is in Ann's lap and they're kissing, deeper and closer than when she got out of work.

Ann stops her when April's hands go under her shirt, getting up and ignoring her urge to throw April down onto the floor by walking over to the coffee pot and pouring herself a cup. As she stood there, she can hear April walking up behind her, and it's only a matter of moments before there's a harsh stream of kisses along Ann's back. April moves to her knees behind Ann and she's kissing her spine, the backs of her thighs, and holding her ass in her hands.

It's impossible to ignore that, and when April spreads her apart from behind, her fingers working slowly, Ann lets it happen. She wants, desperately, to look in April's liquor cabinet to make sure that flask isn't actually alcohol, and that her breath smells and tastes like that from exposure, but there's the younger woman's tongue again. Ann's hands are on the counter, and she's bent her back a little, all while April leads her to come softly once. Standing up, she kisses Ann's neck over and over.

"Why'd you wanna stop?" April asks her, mouthing the nape of her neck all the while. 

"God, I don't," her voice is so whiny and wanting, and so embarrassing to hear. 

There's a smile across her neck then, before another kiss finds its way onto her earlobe. "Then how come I had to sneak up on you like that?" she asks through her teeth, almost hissing through her ear caught in between her lips. 

"Because it was kinda hot," Ann admits, ignoring that hands are pulling down the small, neatly hidden zipper of her skirt. 

"Was it?" April's voice is warm like her mouth, and wet like her tongue playing across Ann's shoulder. "D'you still like this dress?" 

Ann turns around to April in that dress, the shoulder straps falling loosely down her arms. She tugs the skirt off of Ann until she's left in her underwear and April's pushing her back onto the counter. Holding her ankles, April sets her legs up high until she's spread wide and Ann doesn't remember anything other than April leaning down to kiss her through soaked clothing.

 

* * *

 

 

Forgotten bits of clothing mark a path to the couch. Ann's panties sit near the coffee maker, dripping cup after cup onto the platform as Ann's forgotten mug overflows a little, followed by her shirt on the dining room table. April's shoes and her socks sit up against the shirt, right next to the bottle of wine. 

Soft, calming music plays from April's iPod. She started a song when Ann went to remove her bra, watching intently as Ann walked over fully nude to the couch.

"I love all of this," April's hands touch her thigh, move up to her stomach and make small circles, and back down between her legs. "You're so... just so fucking  _hot_ , Ann."

Ann smiles though, because April's mouth replaces her hand and the woman sitting in her little blue dress is dragging her tongue across Ann's pussy. Watching April, so enthusiastic and making Ann shiver in delightful squeaks, makes the worry over the liquor melt away. There isn't much else to think about then, and when April stands up she fingers the fallen straps. 

That dress is on the ground next to the couch, Ann removing it slowly. Each inch of skin it revealed, Ann left a kiss there. When it moved past her breasts she sat there, admiring with her tongue, for so long that she thought April's moans were her own thoughts and the hand on the back of her head had always been there. As it rolled over her waist, Ann clawed into her stomach and dragged her teeth along the skin just under the edge of April's panties.

"You're not so bad yourself," and the smirk that she gets makes the comment worth it, until Ann pulls the rest of the dress down April. 

Sitting on her knees now, Ann leaves a trail along her shins. Ann's hands hold every inch of her legs she can find and all along the way she's letting a kiss fall. Each movement of her lips brings April closer to falling, knees buckling, but Ann holds her steady. 

"Can I have this... every day?" April asks her just as Ann pulls down her underwear and she's kissing the insides of her thighs. 

"After you get off work," Ann starts, running her mouth up to her slit and pulling her open with two fingers.

"I can get off after work?" April's voice has a hint of a laugh, but it dies when Ann presses another finger inside and fucks upward into her. 

"As much as you want," she answers her quietly, slipping a second finger inside soon afterward. She continues, on her knees and April barely standing, until she can feel the telltale movements of her hips and squeezing of her muscles. 

They fall onto the couch, intertwined by legs and arms, until they're slowly moving in and out of sync with the music sailing over their heads. Ann just takes every second of it in stride, April's stomach nestled against flushed labia spread out on her and when her hand reaches between them to touch April gently. All of it's quiet and messy, clothes strewn about the place, while they find a climax in strange contortions - April settling into her hip and rolling herself slick down Ann's leg; she took advantage of that motion to take April's hand in her own and let their clasped hands both finger her. 

When they've stopped, Ann can't even hear the music anymore. Her head's so blank and yet exploding with information being sent all over body, this nerve to that and each of them as plainly wanting as the next, that Ann just keeps her waist lined up with April's and their legs sliding together until they're wrapped in each other.

April falls asleep then, four legs stacked atop one another and both their arousal and skin intermingling all over the sheets and each others' body. Managing to extricate herself from that position is almost impossible, but she does get away from the perfect amalgam of their limbs and put the blanket over April's naked form. 

Walking over to the cabinet where she knows some of the harder alcohol was, Ann opens the door and looks for the bottle of Jack. It still had a small amount left since the last time, but she can't find it. Over the sounds of a dreary electronic number, all fizzling synths and soft drums, Ann searches and searches in hope that the bottle is just in the back of the enclosure. Instead, there's just another bottle of wine and too much tequila. 

Just as the song trails to a finish, Ann hears the squealing of springs as April gets up. 

"Wine's over here, Ann," April walks over to the counter and takes a large gulp straight from the bottle. 

"I know," and she puts on a fake smile, pretending that's what she was looking for.

After all, it seemed to be the time - not just for her, but for both of them - to just sit back and pretend; pretend everything's fine. They could pretend it's all fine, and everything's great. Ann wouldn't look through her purse in search of a flask, and she wouldn't clean out the cabinet still stocked, solely because she forgets to do it. It was as simple as that.

 

 

* * *

 

 

After a week of ignoring her urge to steal April's flask, even though she knows April would just find another way to drink in the bathroom at work or however she managed to slip by, it's a clear Saturday morning. The day before April caught her staring when she took a drink from that little flask and she didn't bother to bring it up or mention anything about it at all. Instead she insisted they go to the cemetery.

She says it'll be a picnic, and brings the last bottle of wine and Ann makes them sandwiches to go. They don't have one of those wicker baskets but Ann's still got her large canvas bag at April's place, and even though it isn't her usual mediocre cooking it's something to eat. It should be weird to be eating in a graveyard, sitting on the grass by a sloping hill in front of a tombstone, but it's strangely fitting at the same time. 

"Enjoying yourself?" April takes a drink and doesn't bother to stop at a small sip. 

"I mean... I'm glad you want me to come with you," Ann smiles through the sun in her eyes, squinting to see April only halfheartedly returning it. "You haven't said a word to... him, though."

It sounds like Ann spat it out, like she didn't understand what this was. Shaking her head, Ann wants to apologize but the words don't form properly in her head. Instead she just sits up on her knees and takes the wine bottle for herself. She thought when they agreed to do something like this that it would be more April talking and saying things she always wanted to say. Instead it was just uncomfortable. 

The only part that Ann enjoyed was April's hand. It stayed on Ann's leg the whole time, and her eyes never moved away from Ann. It felt like she was being observed, once she focused on April scanning her again, and suddenly what was comfortable turned into a strange sort of inspection. Like April was staring inside, past her skin and bones, and trying to search for what Ann was hiding from her. 

"Hey," April's not talking to her though, instead turning her head to the left and looking at the stone, "I hope it's not weird I brought Ann. I mean, you don't really care." 

"April," Ann tilts her head like she's berating her but the other woman just chuckles. 

"You're the one who said you'd come with me, and I just haven't had anything to say to..." April turns her head back and takes a sip out of the bottle, "to him, I guess. Whatever, this is weird."

"No it isn't," Ann struggles to get out. Honestly, it is bothering her that April talks to a heavy stone like she expects it to listen, or what's more likely her hope - to answer her. "It's not crazy, you're not crazy okay? This is just... it's just coping."

"Not all forms of coping are good for you though, are they?" she says almost knowingly, her eyes meeting Ann's before she takes a large gulp of wine. 

Ann quiets, and so does the mood of the picnic. After only a few minutes sitting down the bottle of wine is nearly empty and April's eyes are glazed over, chewing on a sandwich with dark lips, before she stands up abruptly and walks back to the car. 

The drive is long. The silence is around them, and April's hand is still on her leg. The same way, like that was its natural state, and still the drive feels like forever. They leave the car slowly. April's hand doesn't leave Ann's side. When they enter the house she's pushed back into a wall, hard, and April's kissing her roughly. She pushes Ann's shirt up, out of the way, and off in only a few movements. Fingers roll her nipples around between themselves hard, just before teeth replace them.

Falling to the couch, her hand is quick and less loving this time. Two fingers fuck her at an unrelenting pace, April scowling the whole time. Ann comes, sure, but April doesn't let her reciprocate and instead pulls Ann deep into her chest and falls asleep with her head on Ann's shoulder.


	13. Naive

For a few days Ann tries to say something, anything really, about the drinking. It would be one thing if April just up and decided to start drinking every day, and at work, but she can't bring herself to say anything because she knows April's just trying to figure out how the hell to keep going. They could share a bed, spend most of the day together, and Ann would let April do whatever she wanted to her, but there isn't the faintest doubt in her mind that she's just a distraction.

That's what she always fantasized about, so why can't it be as perfect? Ann hates that she thinks all of this, and that it's always directed inward, but it's so natural to think like that she doesn't mind giving in every once and a while. April's rougher in bed, and she's quiet too, and that's what she's always asked for. It's been in her dreams to sleep with April, so why bother?

Living in a house where half of the rooms are off limits, everyone else forbidden by April to go near them, and constantly moving things from her actual home to there feels like existing in a slipspace between two different lives. Transitioning over should feel like she's moving on, like she's approaching something she's always wanted, but it doesn't. Instead it's sort of hollow and forgotten, like a book whose vital chapter is torn clean from the spine. Ann's actual reality, the one where things would never happen like this and she'd be met with perpetual cold from April, in her own home; the other, in April's house, where she's some distraction, just like her drinking. How Ron hasn't caught her is beyond Ann, and why she even cares is impossible to figure out. After all, she's got what she's always wanted.

Right?

 

 

* * *

 

 

April doesn't say anything to Ann anymore. Talking feels like too much work, and she's always  _so tired_ , so when Ann picks her up from work all she can do is drop her hand onto her knee and wait impatiently to get back home. 

It's always quiet, and half the time April doesn't even remember anything about their nights. In the morning Ann watches her pour more into the flask and April doesn't care that they're not saying anything. It's wordless, and silent, and weird. It feels wrong, somehow, to let everything fall apart like this, but after all she's been through that's just what April expects to happen. Ann's just a warm body next to her, and April knows that's all a lie and that she should think differently but who cares. She can't go a second without getting stared at for drinking.

And what does Ann know, anyways?

So she goes into work, and she watches Ron eye her as does her hourly stroll around the floor and into a bathroom stall. Leslie talks to her but April just sits and mindlessly does her job, only answering every once and a while when it seems necessary. It's almost like she becomes a completely different person when she's more than a little drunk at work, and it's absolutely necessary. April decided it was necessary the first day she went back.

It's little things, it always was. The little alcove where a shoeshine stand used to be, or a bench in the courtyard. It always was the smallest details that set April off when she tried going back to work before. In their real life, because she's convinced all of this is just a prolonged nightmare still, it was the small gestures and seemingly obvious things he did. 

April drinks because it's easier being numb. That's what she told Ann, and she means it. 

 

 

* * *

 

 

There's a Saturday when she's sober and they spend the day inside, relaxing on the couch sprawled out together. April's sitting up with her legs next to Ann as she rests across the couch, and her hand's idly in the older woman's hair. It's a different quiet than the last few days; it's a different day, but they're no different. The smell of wine wasn't all over April, and they weren't having sex, but it's comfortable.

Some small part of Ann is praying that this can stay. A different, much larger part of her knows it won't.

"How come..." Ann sighs because she knows she shouldn't ask about it but can't help to, "how come you stay out in the living room?"

April looks down at her and if she's angry it's not on her face. Maybe they've gotten close enough to talk about these things. "The couch folds out, and there's blankets and stuff out here," April tries and shrugs. "I dunno, why does it matter?"

"It doesn't," Ann returns her look and gives a weak smile, "but wouldn't you rather sleep in your own bed?"

"No," she answers flatly.

Ann furrows her brow but just rests her head back on the armrest and April goes back to running her hand through hair. They don't say another word about the bedroom that night, or really anything at all. Sitting up after a while, she makes sure to kiss April before going to get a drink.  Back on the couch she holds April's hand, eventually pulling her into Ann's lap, while she reads and Ann watches whatever channel she flipped to. When they go down for the night, Ann turns in April's arms and just matches her stare until they both fall asleep.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Ann finally gets rid of the liquor graveyard sitting on the kitchen counter the next day. 

April starts a new lineup a few hours later.


	14. Here With Me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Posting today because I don't think I'll be around to post on Saturday. Enjoy! Maybe?

With no light anywhere in the house, sometime so late she doesn't even know the hour, April sits with her back against a door. The bedroom door. Sounds of light breathing, peaceful sleeping, come from just a few steps away on the foldout couch while she tosses the key in the air and catches it over and over again. 

Staring at it, watching it like it's the only thing in the room, April doesn't realize the sun's starting to come up. She must have been sitting there for at least an hour, but she can't tell how long it really was. Instead of worrying about it, she tucks the key under a jar above the washing machine and slips back under the covers beside Ann. It's too hard sitting with her head smacking against the door when there's sunlight illuminating the room, because otherwise she can pretend she isn't crying.

 

 

* * *

 

 

A few days later, Ann wakes up to a cold absence next to her. Sitting up on her hands, she looks over and sees a figure crouched in front of the bedroom door. A large something keeps getting raised to the April's mouth, a long silence before a gulp, and then she puts it back next to her on the floor.

The previous weeks have been a silent disconnect, like two people that didn't really want to be around each other but didn't know any better. Hating that atmosphere, Ann pulls the blankets away from her and walks over to where she knows April is sitting. Her eyes get used to the darkness quickly. Wishing against that, not wanting to see what April's like at this hour in this state, Ann sits in front of the young woman.

April lifts her head up and stares at Ann.

"D'you need help?" Ann asks her quietly, barely more than a whisper.

April nods immediately.

"Will I do?" Ann chuckles with a bleak tinge, aware of what she is to April. 

April stares back hard. "Yeah," her voice is gravelly and dry. "I need you, Ann."

"Come here," Ann opens her arms for April.

The other woman leaves the bottle against the wall and slinks over to Ann. Crawling on her hands, she puts herself into the nurse's lap and curls into a tight ball there. Ann drops her chin lightly on the sleek wave of hair just as a small choking sound comes from April. She shakes a little and Ann instinctively wraps her arms around her, squeezing April into a hug in the dark. 

Kissing the top of her head, Ann makes comforting, quieting sounds. "Sh," she whispers, "c'mon, baby. Sh, April."

April shivers again and a whiny, sharp noise comes out of her before Ann feels something wet hit her arm where April's head is. She's crying. It hits Ann like a brick lobbed directly at her back, slamming into her without warning before she's cooing between the short sobs. Holding her closer, still sitting in front of the door, Ann tries her best to sway in a relaxing rhythm. 

"It's gonna be okay," Ann says and kisses the back of her head again. "Baby, I swear it's gonna be okay."

"Is it?" April chokes out, turning her head slightly to look at Ann. Her eyes, as best she can make out, look tired and there's something else there.

April looks terrified, she guesses. It isn't just a plain fear or the kind of feeling that's telling her lover things will never get better. There's something else behind her words and her eyes that's pleading for help, and forgiveness and so many other things Ann doesn't understand. She just looks so tired of everything, so  _gone_. Maybe it's the hour, or the dark, or the dryness in Ann's lips at hearing that question and seeing her. 

"I'll make it okay," Ann promises, knowing how dangerous it is to say all of this. "We can do it together, we'll make sure it's okay. It's gonna be okay."

April darts instantly to kiss Ann on the mouth, but it isn't like the last weeks. Her tongue doesn't force itself on her, dominating Ann into a deeper kiss. It's a soft movement of lips, both of them tired and pressed tightly into the other woman, and it's enough.

"I'm..." April sighs and drops her head on Ann's forearm, nuzzling her a little, "I'm scared, Ann."

"I know," she lifts the hand near April's face and cups her cheek, shifting her head so they can look at each other. "I know it's gonna be hard, but I... I promise we can make it work. It'll be-"

"Okay," April finishes, a tiny hint of a smile playing on her lips. 

"Come back to bed?" Ann suggests, nodding backward. 

"I need you now, Ann," April whispers, her hand moving to Ann's bare shoulder. 

She means to say it'll be better on the couch, in the comfort of warm sheets and blankets, but April moves to kissing that same bare shoulder. She mouths hard against the bone and Ann moans softly, immediately tilting her head towards the amazing sensation of those lips. April's hands slide underneath the tank top, stilling just above Ann's hips and shifting to her back intermittently. Covering her shoulder in small pecks, shifting her collarbone and up to the shallow dip just above there, April makes a trail all the way up Ann's neck.

Her tongue swirls against bits of skin at random, sometimes sucking down hard and sometimes just playing a little with the tips of her teeth. Underneath the tank, two hands look so large against the thin material as they run up to Ann's nipples. 

Pinching softer than what she's grown accustomed to, April finally kisses Ann on the lips again. There's no biting there, just the press of their mouths together and the dry peeling apart as they back off and dive back in harder. Eventually they open up, April simply holding onto Ann under the shirt and letting lethargic movements of their tongues take precedence. 

"Can I have you?" April asks quietly. 

"Of course," Ann answers without even taking a breath, the words spilling out hoarsely. 

"Fuck, I need you," April pushes back hard against Ann and they topple to the floor.

Ann's back smacks down a little hard but April's focusing on her jaw and down to her throat. None of the brief pain matters when she's sucking on her neck, just above her collarbone. Balling her shirt up around her breasts, April shoots down to kiss her stomach and drag a wet circle around her bellybutton. Whining softly, Ann doesn't mind that April immediately presses her mouth into her panties. Most times they just sleep naked, and at their most clothed it's just thin shirts and occasionally underwear.

It's the most comfortable Ann's ever been in bed with anyone despite the weeks gone by. Being able to move over and dip her hand low to feel April, and to drop down and lick her into a staggering wetness, is all she's wanted. 

"April, you should let me-" 

Ann means to say something but April is giving open, full kisses to her pussy now. They're not like her attentions, patterns and rhythms of tongue and her lips meant to get Ann off, and instead feel like she's trying to apologize in some way. She dips her head to kiss her thighs, sliding over and mouthing her labia a bit before opening and always keeping her lips against Ann. 

"It's gonna be okay," April repeats, kissing again, and again, and again. It happens so much, and for so long, Ann loses control of place and finds herself coming just from that. 

She leans up and sits on her elbows, watching April, and moans with a half-open mouth at April's pressure. She never introduces a rough bundle of fingers, or even her tongue, just kisses and only against her clothed body. 

Eventually April does slip her underwear down to Ann's knees and rolls her face along her. It's an amazing sensation that puts Ann into a shuddering blackout, forgetting everything up until April's pressing her mouth deep into Ann and her nose and upper lip slam into her clit. Breathing hard is all Ann can think to do - breathe, lick, breathe, suck,  _breathe_.

Her knees rise and April holds onto her thighs, lifting her up by her ass into her mouth further for a better angle. Sitting on her palms, hiked up just a bit and letting April find the exact spot - just a small bit where April let her tongue run inside of her - that Ann loved.

"Hey, hey... fuck, April," Ann's hips roll a bit, angling sideways and making April's tongue fill her differently. "Let me-"

April doesn't say anything, only curling the tip of her tongue and flicking inward with the muscle. It makes Ann literally scream out into the night, a rough yell coming out of her when April does it again. Ann swells up around her, her body completely giving in to April, until she shakes violently into an orgasm. Her nails scrape at the floor, carpet running underneath her fingers while April eats her harder and harder, until Ann can feel one of them snap against the rug. 

It doesn't matter, she can barely notice the pain, because April moves her head up and down while she's still inside. Her nose moves in a minute, jittery pattern up her the whole time and Ann claws into the floor again. Noises that hurt to make eke out of her, little panicked yelps that turn into drawls of pleasure. When April finally moves off of her those lips are glistening, and when they kiss she tastes like nothing but Ann. Whatever she took with her, the bottle sitting next to the door, is completely gone for the salacious flavor.

"Ann," April whispers into her lips, staring at her with lidded eyes. 

"Yeah?"

"Make love to me," she mumbles, folding her hands across Ann's back and pulling her on top until they've switched positions. 

Something about asking for that - not asking to be  _fucked_ but for Ann, and for  _love_ \- makes Ann's heart shatter. April's just desperate for something, anything, that isn't her daily routine in her head and Ann is more than willing to give her that. If it's all she ever wants from Ann, that'll be okay.

Ann kisses her on the corner of her mouth, moving down to her chin and back up to her lips. She groans into Ann's mouth, almost pleading, and Ann quickly slips her out of the t-shirt. 

"April, you're so beautiful," she says, kissing down to her breast and touching a nipple with her lips as she spoke. "You're the best. Your tits are the best, and I could fuck you all day-"

"Just... make love to me, Ann," April repeats and when Ann looks up she's staring down. 

Ann nods and moves her free hand from squeezing down to April's, lacing their fingers together. Holding tight, she rolls her tongue up and down the nub of flesh spiked into her mouth. April presses her chest further, almost filling Ann's mouth with her breast. The taste is sweet, the taste of April. It's finer than she ever dreamed of. So, Ann continues to suck down and yet farther down April's body until there must be a roadway of hickeys from nipple to clit.

She drags the full warmth of her lips around the beady bundle, suctioning her cheeks into a little pressure all around her. April whines loudly in response. There's the telltale feeling of her opening around Ann's thumb sliding up and down her, slick and covered in April's overflowing juices. Still, Ann puts her thumb and forefinger in her mouth and spreads April apart just to press the index in gently.

"Like that?" Ann says it so softly that the only sound is April writhing against the carpet and her muffled groans.

"Mhm," she rolls her lips and nods.

Ann smiles to herself, just a little bit, and puts her bottom lip just above her finger. Pulling her lip up, dragging but not kissing, Ann slides up to April's clit and clamps down with her lips with tiny pressure. Faint murmurs of praise are enveloped with April's voice cracking, a stuttery moan coming when Ann hums into her pussy. Vibration and kisses, Ann moaning into her, makes April arch her back high off the ground.

"Like that," April simpers when she looks down. 

"Mmm," is all Ann can say because there's too much of April caught in her mouth to give a coherent response. 

There's too much to cover - she has to give attention to her lips, suck on them and slide along them with her lips, and she has to make sure she hits April's favorite little spot just at the bottom of her slit and Ann had to run her tongue through there to find April's climax easily, not to mention her legs and stomach, her breasts and her mouth - but Ann has to give it her best try, and she'll gladly die from suffocation if that meant she'd breathe in April at her last. Dipping her head lower, Ann presses her tongue into her lover just where she knows April will fall apart and she does. It makes her squeal loudly and immediately come.

April always left a bit for Ann, some delicious come for her to taste and decide whether she actually liked tasting another woman like that or if it was just because it was  _this_ woman, and the pungent flavor just drives her further. Shifting her mouth into a vaguely diamond shape, Ann pulls her bottom lip back and quickly forces her tongue upward and angling into April. 

She shudders again, and Ann's rewarded once more. Sucking her down, Ann tilts her head to let April have the flat edges of her tongue penetrate harder and deeper than before. All of this just makes the other woman cry out. Cries of pleasure, and not tears. That's all Ann wants to hear. She wants to hear April respond to her rolling the tongue inside of her up into a curling fold of muscle, and then screaming out because Ann can flip her tongue around the opposite way and fold it downward. 

When she stops bucking into Ann's mouth, she moves up to lay on top of her and kiss her. April's nipples are still hard against Ann's breasts, and their hands are still grasped tightly at the side. The friction of their bodies moving together makes Ann quietly shake for a second and then sit with her waist between April's legs. They roll to their sides, a naked entanglement, and April keeps kissing her.

"Thank you," April whispers, moving her unclasped hand to touch Ann's cheek.

"It's not like I don't enjoy it-"

"Not for that," April's eyes fall down to Ann's lips. She bunches up her brow before settling her forehead into Ann's shoulder and pressing the two of them as close as possible.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 2.12.2015 - I'm so sorry, but I doubt I will be posting this Saturday. I might, but I've recently come into very serious financial and living situation problems. 
> 
> I hope you understand. I hope to see you guys in a few days, but who knows.


	15. Clamoring for Your Heart

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you've noticed, I will no longer be posting on a schedule because of a few personal things that might put me in a situation where posting on set days just won't work for me. I don't think this will mean every other day posting like before, though.
> 
> Either way, enjoy!

"April," she says it quietly, afraid to disturb her.

She's still buried in Ann's shoulder, and there's something distinctly wet building up all over her chest. Taking a deep breath, she has to keep herself from breaking down over this. She can be the strong one, Ann tells herself, and she can be the one to make things better. She has to be.

Still, it takes a few seconds for April to look back up at her. "I'm okay," she croaks out slowly.

"You sure?" Ann asks her in that same, hushed tone. She definitely doesn't  _look_ okay; April's eyes are wild but tired, empty yet staring constantly at Ann.

"Mhm," she mutters, putting her head back on Ann's shoulder.

"You don't wanna talk about it?" Ann poses the question as gently as she can, moving her hands to April's back. 

Still, the younger woman just sits there unmoving. Her legs move around Ann, holding her closer and locking ankles behind her back. Trying to maintain as tight a hold as possible, and she's sitting there hoping that Ann will just shut up. That has to be it. There isn't anything else that she should be thinking right now, not after whatever hellish rollercoaster ride they've been on for the past few weeks starts crashing down. 

Without making any sudden gestures, Ann tips her head up by the chin. Holding her there with one finger, she moves her thumb around her neck in miniscule motions and just watches the girl's eyes flicker all over her face.

"Talk about what?" April's voice is still shaky, still a little scared.

"I mean that," Ann nods towards the door as best she can from the floor. "You're... we need to. I think we have to."

"Why?" April shifts to an indignant grimace but that falls so quickly Ann knows she's thinking the same thing. "I know... I just, I don't know if I can."

"We've gone and... we've talked to him," the words make her lips chap and dry almost instantly. April closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. "Why's this-"

"Yeah, and look where that got us," April's fingers play on Ann's shoulder. Walking them up to her neck, she takes her index and middle fingers and moves them back to her arm. "Everytime I say anything about him it makes me think. It makes me hate myself."

"You're not doing anything wrong," Ann keeps her arms around April, trying to ignore the feeling of her heels digging into her spine. "You don't have to-"

"But I do, okay? I can't stop thinking that what I'm doing is so... I hear him every day. I hear him telling me that I never loved him, and if I'm doing this I'm afraid he might be right," she sniffs hard and shakes her head against Ann's shoulder. "I can't, Ann. I  _do_ and I did love him. I'm screwing up it; everything we had, I'm fucking it up."

Ann takes a moment to process that. She was never great at the more complex sides of her relationships, and it was the reason she was completely fine moving on from different guys over and over again, but April - and Ann tries not to think that it might just be her state, and not actually  _April_ \- makes her want to try and figure this out. Something was there, and she needed to figure this out for herself but if Ann could at least try and help then it'd be worth it. It was the least she could do, especially when standing still left  _her_ to think and consider what all this is for.

"Because you're moving on? April, just because this is happening doesn't mean you stop loving him," she says while tilting her head down, trying to catch April's stare.

April sighs and looks up, finally. "You don't get it," April chuckles. "Every single night, I see him. I see him, I hear him, it's everywhere. I hated him for just  _talking_ about you... and now, what am I doing?"

Ann struggles to find an argument to stand on. "You're trying to get better," she says.

"I'm betraying him," her face is as bleak as what she's saying. "Every time I look at that door and think about going in there, it's like accepting that he's gone all over again."

"But that's good - you've got to accept that fact-"

"That he's gone, I know," April nods but her voice is falling apart and her ankles are loosening their grip around Ann. "I know I do, and I know you're trying. I just don't think I can do it."

"You can. I know you can," Ann finally moves to cup her face and angle her back up. 

Rolling her thumb across April's cheek, Ann moves to kiss her forehead gently. Pulling back, a little streak falls down April's face but neither of them are going to say a word about it. Ann, as it is, can barely keep herself held together and saying even a word about it might just break the illusion that she's strong enough to work through this. If all she could offer was that illusion then she'll try her damnedest to keep it up.

"What makes you so sure?" April chokes out in a breath.

Ann gives her a tiny smile, just a wayward shift of one side of her mouth. "I believe in you," she nods, "and I-"

"Please don't say it," April interrupts her quickly, stealing the words out from under her. "I know you do. I know... just don't say it. Not right now. Please?"

Nodding her head, there's a harsh prickling in the back of her eyes but Ann fights it back as best she can. "Okay," Ann gets out. "I won't say it, baby."

Holding her closer, pulling her into a tight embrace, Ann keeps nodding until April quiets her breathing and the rough sobs stop on her shoulder. There's a few minutes where all she can see is the sleek white light of the moon washing over her hair, and then April shifts up to kiss Ann. Where they were wanting, or abrupt, and everything from lustful to painful this small meeting of their lips - just a peck, not much else - felt  _loving_. 

Ann knew it now, but April didn't want to hear it. She didn't want to say it back, either. At least she knew, and Ann falls asleep on the floor wrapped in April thinking that this can make everything just a little bit better.


	16. All That's Left

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't worry, I didn't forget about this story! Roadblocks both in real life and in writing have postponed this chapter for far too long. I really didn't think it'd be this long between chapters.
> 
> There is much to accomplish here, yet. I hope some of you stuck around!

In the morning they awkwardly disentangle and Ann watches her as carefully as she can with sidelong glances. After April takes an almost uncomfortably long time to get dressed, Ann makes sure to take her time getting ready in the morning. Something in her brain clicked last night, and something told her to let April take as long as she needs. So, that's what will happen. Making sure to at least make some toast so that April has breakfast, and driving to City Hall so that she can eat it on the way there if she wants to; just the little things. It's just the little things she has to start with. When she clicks down the little black plunger April's arms are around her and holding Ann close. So she gives in and stands there watching the toaster with April's cheek nuzzled into her shoulder blade, waiting the few minutes for the pop to grab the toast and hand the slices to April.

She takes a slow, furtive bite when Ann turns around. Ann leaves a quick kiss on the corner of her mouth where some crumbs collected, moving over to the fridge to take out her bottles of water still in there. April watches her intently, again, and it's like that when Ann passes over the liquor cabinet and where she knows the little flask is. April breathes heavily but opens it anyways, leaving the other woman to sit there and wonder if she can even say anything. But she told April she would help, so is this her dilemma? Is helping her making her stop, or at least attempting to make her stop? What if April hates her for it, even if she grew remarkably cold and distant the last time Ann noticed anything about her new work-drinking habit, and Ann gets pushed aside again? Selfishly, she knows this will hurt both of them but maybe that would be better. Judging by how difficult it is for April to even reconcile her feelings for Ann and willing to accept her near declaration of love the night before, and still trying to fight her own fear that this makes her a monster, Ann knows it actually might be.

Then, as if reading her mind, April hands her the second piece of toast and leans forward to kiss her softly on the cheek before heading over to the couch where her purse sits. Taking a bite out of her breakfast, they walk out together a few minutes later. This is going to be a more difficult day at work because Leslie explicitly asked for Ann to come in and resume her strange position of partially working there, but not really, while mostly just hanging around her. Something about that is terrifying, but she makes sure not to say anything about it to April. Instead she'll let her free hand droop to April's sitting on the divider between them and tap her knuckle until she threads her fingers in Ann's because there isn't much else to worry about on the road to work than that. 

 

 

* * *

 

 

"Ann, I need to talk to you," Leslie says at the exact moment she barges into her office. "It is vitally important and also a meeting. Ann I need you in a meeting, now."

Moving from her monitor to stare at her friend, Ann's eyes widen. "Okay, do I get to know what this is about or...?" 

To be honest she's partially afraid of what the meeting could be about. Leslie's out of breath and has less the whirlwind of enthusiasm about her and more the part of herself that scares Ann - overbearing worry and confusion, perhaps some real fear there or just too much sugar - and it definitely doesn't help that April has that flask. That little thought creeps into her head and buries itself until she can't shake a minor case of nerves when Leslie takes a moment to recompose herself. What if she finds out that April's drinking at work? Somehow they managed to get her job back for her, but that couldn't last very long if she was caught. Then what would happen? No one knew about them, though she suspects a few people may have seen them at the entrance to the Parks department, and it scares her what could happen after they knew. 

"Just please come with me. April's already waiting for us, and I need you as well," she rushes out of her office, not even bothering to wait for Ann to respond.

The walk down to the conference room is a hard one. Every step rebounds with the possibility of April being fired for real this time, and not left on an extended leave at Leslie's insistence, not to mention whatever that could mean. Even if it was a minor upswing, April spiraling out of control with no job at all was what led to her almost hermetically sealed off, broken self. 

Opening the door, it's a little less distressing when it's just the three of them. Or maybe it's worse. April doesn't automatically catch her look but when she does there isn't any immense fear or worry there, just a little boredom and annoyance. That was a whole lot more comforting than whatever she was going through the last few months. Still, Ann instinctually sits next to April like she can do anything to keep her more comfortable. When she looks up at Leslie, the worry's still there but there isn't any weird insistence on making them move apart or a disgusted grimace like she fears might come out of this. Trying not to think about it, Ann lets out a sigh. Maybe April mistook that as a worried, deep breath because her hand goes to Ann's thigh quickly and sits there, her thumb moving just a bit against her.

"S-So, you wanted to see us?" Ann starts a little shakily. Whether that's because Leslie might fire April or because that woman has her hand up her skirt and against her naked thigh, Ann doesn't know. 

Leslie clears her throat and starts slowly. "I... I know what's going on," she finally says.

Ann tries to hold a gasp in, but she can't help it. Again, that might be because April squeezes her leg a little harder than she'd like or because what Leslie just said. Trying to maintain her composure, Ann just gives Leslie a confused look. 

"I don't think April should work in the Parks department for now," Leslie explains, "because I don't think it's good for her. Too many memories, maybe, but I think she'd do better in another department."

"What'd you have in mind?" April intones low, feathering her fingertips along Ann's leg and down her inner thigh. 

"I was thinking-" Leslie starts, but Ann sucks in another breath when fingers slide closer to her and sit lengthwise down her thighs again. "I was thinking that, maybe, she can assist you Ann. Since you've spent so much time with April, you two probably already know Ann's schedule inside and out-" a finger taps down until it hits Ann's panties and makes her close her eyes tight for a second, forgetting what Leslie said. 

For a few seconds, Ann breathes in time with April's index finger running up and down slowly. A calm little trail from tenting her skirt with a knuckle down to the bottom of her lips where a distinct wetness built up against her panties. Maybe Leslie asked her another question, but Ann's trying to keep her eyes open and not lean back into the chair. Her nail drags along what April can no doubt tell is Ann's usual immediate arousal at her touch. It's almost silly how is it must be - how close to just  _breathing on her_ can make her want to drop onto the floor on her knees. She doesn't care if Leslie's in the conference room with them. Hell, she can watch; it doesn't matter to her. Anything would do to make her chest stop burning for April and that finger to dip just underneath the little bit against her thighs. 

"Ann?" Leslie breaks through her shaky thoughts, April's thumb rubbing her leg in counterclockwise circles, off-time with her index finger now speeding up a little. "Ann, what's your opinion on this?"

"I think..." she stops, turning to look at April who's taken to staring at Ann and actually flicks her eyes down to look at her wrist sitting against Ann's leg. Ann actually lets out a sharp moan, very quiet, but it doesn't seem to register to Leslie. "I think it's an amazing idea."

April's finger stops and she folds her hands over the desk. Apparently thinking better of it, April runs her pointer finger - the one she just threatened Ann with - against her lips and drags it across her bottom lip before settling back into her chair. Leslie seems perfectly unaware and thrilled.

"Amazing! I'm so glad that you two will be working together, and I think you'll make a great team," she smiles with an exuberance only Leslie has and stands up quickly. "She can get to work immediately. I already sent everything up the chain and had it approved. She can move into your office right away-"

"Oh, we'll be sharing an office..." Ann starts, turning to look at April whose eyes have a light in them she hasn't seen in a long time. "That should be great."

 

 

* * *

 

 

It works out, at least that first day. The door rattles closed and the little blinds shut nicely, just in time for Ann to have April against her desk and slide to her knees quickly. Dropping the younger woman's panties to her knees and kissing up her leg enthusiastically is only met by a shaking moan. Likewise, that first time she gets April off in her office with her mouth is just what  _she_ needs. A little distraction to take her nerves after thinking that April could get fired, and going down on April will have to do. Her voice cracks a bit and April comes with her tongue going to work, as usual, and still thrusting and pulsing inside of her.

When she's bent over her own desk and April keeps one finger thrusting until Ann's tightening every muscle just so she doesn't scream in City Hall, that's maybe what  _April_ needs. Maybe she wants that little bit of control back in her life, and being told to stay on her stomach and have April grope her breast and finger her roughly, again, would have to do. She could take a third finger spreading her open impossibly far, and making her head do tilts and wonderful spins in bliss, just to press in and curl into an arc that makes Ann breathe out curses.

"April," she whispers, coming around her hand with her lower back pushed down on, hard, by the younger woman. "Fuck...  _please_. More, please."

"Anything the boss wants," April leans over her body and kisses Ann's back, coated in sweat, through her blouse. "The boss gets."

Slipping a finger out, index and middle go to work inside of her again. April squats down and takes one of Ann's hands, joining it with hers. They both go to her clit, two thumbs working mercilessly against her for what feels like a day and a half. Afterwards, April flattens her skirt and sits at her small, mobile desk across from Ann. That whole time Ann's still reeling and bent over her own desk, the cup full of pens scattered across the floor and her mousepad gripped tight in a ball in her fist.

Maybe this  _would_ be okay. _  
_


	17. Oh Euphoria

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  _Trying_ to find a schedule again, so we'll see if I can stick to that!

Ann sometimes wonders if this is all a game. Everything has changed since then, and there's someone different lying across her underneath those sheets, and yet sometimes the old April shines through in a way that she doesn't know how to deal with. Sometimes she's almost impossible to deal with like the one from less than a year ago, and in a way that's infinitely more comforting than the one that she sees at home almost every night. That April has a tendency of sprawling out on top of her and not saying a word for upwards of the rest of the night, and sometimes into the next morning. So, maybe, it's all a scheme.

Thinking like that makes Ann grimace at nothing, in the dark, and get out from under the covers and pour herself a glass of water. Gulping it down quickly, the thoughts come back. There's something there, and Ann thinks maybe April's just toying with her. That's what she would have done before, so why not now? Something's different, and yet April's getting ever so close to at least seeming like her old self, and with that could mean those days of shoving Ann up into the shelf in her office are a game to her. Why couldn't she believe that, though? Setting the glass down without making a noise, she slips back into bed and accepts the automatically shifting arms wrapping up around her. 

She can feel April stir awake. She does the same shaking, stretching movements that she knows by now. 

Ann picks up one hand and brings it to her mouth, kissing her fingertips. "You okay, baby?" she whispers into her palm before bringing it back down to her chest. "You wanna go back to sleep?"

"Mmm," April hums before pushing herself closer and settling her face to nuzzle Ann's shoulder.

"Okay," and she turns a little to move in, joining April.

That must be why.

 

 

* * *

 

 

April starts to dread the taste of whiskey. Even thinking the word makes her gag, but she'll drink it anyways. If in the day she has Ann's body to console her, and at night she has sleep, the hours caught between are given to alcohol. That way she has the complete relief without sobriety, a blank release in Ann's mouth, and a dreadful fifty-fifty of a fitful sleep or an impossible one laden with nightmares.

You ask her, sex and booze are much better than pain and fear. She thinks all of this walking back from lunch, going back to her mobile desk in Ann's office.

She closes the blinds and sits herself on Ann's desk, bringing the older woman's head between her legs. She was a second from thinking about taking everything back and kicking Ann out of her house before she has to lean back onto the desk, scrambling papers and sending little jars full of knick-knacks flying. Ann laps her up, a tongue now experienced with pleasing April working in little strokes and broken, zigzagging semicircles, and does it all without protest. She takes fistfuls of Ann's hair and thrusts herself into the mouth against her pussy until she's fucking Ann's mouth with the best of her ability. 

And when she sits up, breathless, she pats Ann's cheek and kisses her on the mouth. Before she can help herself and walk back to her desk, April sits on the lap of this woman she's given herself to. She has to stop herself from thinking like that, though, because she's not meant to be given. She's not meant to be taken, either, except for by one person and it's not Ann. Still, she will undo the pants Ann's wearing and slip her hand inside while taking mouthfuls of her tongue and moaning in the middle of the day. Before long that hand she meant just to press next to Ann is moving two digits in circles like she knows Ann can't resist, her palm hard against the little fleshy button of a clit that, in just a few movements and seconds, is naked and in April's mouth.

She can't help it when she makes Ann come twice in her office, because by now this is all her workday is comprised of. Drinking, lunch break, some tiny amount of actual work that she's surprised no one calls her out on, and then sitting on her knees underneath Ann's desk.

 

* * *

 

It might be because of the way April treats Ann, holds her close and doesn't let go at night, but it's also the way Ann gets to treat  _her_. They may not share a shower or bath the same way, or spend their meals fully clothed, but she can settle down on top of April with the younger woman's mouth deep between her legs and her own mouth moving in sharp angles against April. 

Maybe it's because they share things now. Little things like where they want to spend the night, or even smaller details like which flat surface Ann's back is going to slam into next. 

Maybe it's because they have nights that aren't spent barely holding on, and they can be closer. Or it's the way April pushes her tongue inside of her and unabashedly fucks her with pressure and thrusts of that muscle.

Maybe it's because they're becoming less a function of parts, slowly forming into a unit and a whole. Perhaps it's that, but it could also be the way that April likes to rub her nose against bits of flesh that her mouth can't get to. It could be the heady moans that come out after, from both of them or neither of them Ann can't quite make anything out when she comes around April's movements, but she's not sure. Ann doesn't know, and maybe doesn't care, if she'll ever know what it is, exactly.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Or because of nights like the one only a few days later. 

They're soft, quiet nights where April sits in Ann's lap and huddles closer to the crook of her arm. Their hands are clasped and April shivers a little, but they both know it's not because it's cold. Ann kisses the back of her head and rests her chin there after, whispering nonsense words of comfort. They're little noises that sound more like soft coos and mutters that you'd say to a child afraid of the dark. Which, in its own way, is what April is right then. 

"Do you think you can do it tonight?" Ann says into her hair.

"I can try," there's a nod against her lips that makes Ann smile.

"C'mon," and she takes the cold metal and puts it in April's hand.

They walk through the living room and into the hall slowly. It's more like April walking with Ann dragged behind, holding hands, and when they get to the door she moves her arms around April's waist. There's a few seconds where Ann thinks she can do it. She moves her hands over the soft skin of her stomach, kissing behind April's ear. Gestures of encouragement, or so she hopes, but they only make April seize up and drop the keys on the floor. 

In another breath she turns around and kisses Ann, sloppy and hard, with a tremor in her lips that betrays the need in her kiss. It doesn't take long before they're back on the couch, April straddling her stomach, and Ann honestly - and in the morning she hates herself more for realizing this - completely forgets all about the door. All that matters is April kissing her like that again, and the way her hands fit perfectly on the younger woman's thighs. Finding her lips dry and her mouth forced onto Ann's feels more normal, and it's both a painful reminder of the time when April would roughly fuck her into submission - she wouldn't call it making love, not what happened in those days - and the nights when April fell apart right next to her. All of those days are things she has permanently scarred in her brain, but Ann never stops to think about what's going on in April's head. All that matters is April riding her chest with hands slipping up underwear, and any thought meant for reclaiming April's security and health transforms into blood-red lust with a taste for the girl.


	18. Caring is Creepy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Easter Sunday update? Okay, then.
> 
> Makes sense to me. Gotta continue the plot ramping.

There are a few days where Ann thinks she stops drinking, in all honesty April does. She thinks she can do it, and she doesn't take the stupid little flask that's almost part of her daily routine now. It's so much harder to get away with it when Ann's your boss, in theory, so she lets it sit in the liquor cabinet so that Ann's morning checkup can let her know it's in there. She's so much warmer on the drive to City Hall, and it's an honest mixture of creepy and relieving to have someone act like that around her.

Leslie's one of her best friends, but she had ambitions and most of them - in fact, all of them if April thinks about it - could be found without her around. She doesn't blame her for leaving her to rot and die in her own house, it's what she'd want her to do, but it's not the absolute worst that Ann knows what she's thinking about the two of them and doesn't hold it against her. April can't help it. Even if she wanted to stop loving him, or to forget about him, she couldn't and that's why the flask stays in the cabinet for five days.

On the sixth, she wakes up in a cold sweat from a night terror and on that, the sixth day, she takes the flask.

Ann doesn't look at her until lunch.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Her breath stinks and she knows it. It smells of betrayal and, physically, wine. She doesn't take whiskey anymore because April knows better, though wine isn't quite as undetectable as she seems to think, but Ann can't blame her. Her head's all sorts of fucked up, and she's trying to be as good a person - girlfriend? Lover? _Person_ works - as she can be in the tiniest hope that April will get better.

At lunch, she makes up her mind to apologize. Even if it was a lapse, she can't be this way to her. It's not fair, and she's not rewarding her behavior and instead simply understanding that everyone makes mistakes. Maybe that makes Ann a better person, or actually a worse one that's just enticing April to keep drinking at work, but she sighs when April sits and stares at a little plastic container in front of her. A Pawnee City Hall sandwich is made more depressing only when it's a lonely City Hall sandwich, despite Ann sitting across from her.

She looks so depressed, and not in a dream girl, movie sort of stupid sense where her "depression" meant finding love. April sits there with her hands in her lap and stares at her food like it's going to be a challenge getting down, and that it's too much for her, and that she doesn't deserve it. Her eyes don't search it, trying to figure it out, and instead just stay transfixed to the little plastic box. Her hands don't move, jittery and unsure, and instead sit dead in her lap. 

"Hey, April," she says softly but loud enough.

She perks up and taps the lid of the container.

"C'mere," she beckons for her with a hand and it takes April a few moments. "Come here. C'mon."

April gets up and takes her little container with her, dropping it on Ann's desk and standing in front of her. Again, that tied up hair and overlarge sweater that Ann refuses to ask anything about just makes her look like she's given up. Ann shakes her head and beckons for her again. It takes a few moments before she hesitantly walks behind the desk and almost lowers to her knees. Ann grabs her wrist and smiles without saying anything. This isn't the time for that, no matter what her brain is firing off telling her to do. All of it she pushes the back of her head and slides back in the chair. Pulling April, she lets the younger woman work her way into Ann's lap.

She sits there for a moment, uncomfortable, and Ann touches a stray lock of hair, pushing it back behind her ear. They're quiet and neither of them even make a physical advance, but then Ann takes her bowl and puts in the small space left on her leg. She takes a bit and rests a hand on April's side before letting it slink back and down to her hip. 

"Hey," April says without looking at her, picking her sandwich container up. 

"Mmm?" Ann asks, mouth full of salad.

"These sandwiches suck," she laughs and tosses it into the waste basket next to Ann's desk. "Can I have some of yours?"

Ann chuckles. "Sure," and she lifts the fork up and April lowers her head to take a bite.

It's sweet, and gentle, and it's okay. She doesn't have to know that April tastes like wine right now, and they don't have to know what the other tastes like at that exact moment. It's not the time, really. Instead, it was time to sit there and recover, again. Ann realizes that's what this is - part of a cycle of recovery. One makes a mistake, then apologizes, and then the other fucks up or breaks down, and they try to fix it, and before long it repeats. Maybe it would always repeat for them, like an endless and infinitely spinning wheel where each pothole and obstruction in the road is just one of those mistakes and fuck ups. 

Maybe they'd be caught like that forever, but for April it was worth it.

"You good?" Ann asks with a trace of laughter in her voice, touching April's hair pulled up like this. It's pretty, and not sexy or hot. It's just pretty, and that's all it has to be - if it has to be anything at all.

"Yeah, I think," she answers with a dark, low chuckle. "I've just been fed by Ann Perkins and it's totally not weird at all."

"It's a little weird," Ann taps her hip with a finger, smiling.

"A little gay too," she rests her back against Ann's shoulder and they both share laughter. "Does that make it weird?"

"Makes it us," Ann kisses her cheek and goes to finishing the salad that's left for her. Not much, to be honest, but she'll take it if it means this position.

"Yeah, it does," April says, almost knowingly but never continues or expands that.

Ann thinks about that cycle. The important part was breaking it. She could do that. Ann was always great at breaking things - hearts, people, hell tupperware and glasses, you name it she's broken it - so what would this be? A challenge? Not likely. Especially if it meant she could dig past a dead heart for that little bit of  _love_ she knows is there for April and make it the most important thing right now. She could say fuck it to her desires and wishes for a little while if it meant April laughing and warming up to sardonic comments directed at her. At least, Ann thinks she can do all of that and more than a little bit of her is terrified she can't.

April turns her head, looking at Ann and leans down to kiss her. It's gentle and soft, another apology, because Ann doesn't open up and April doesn't force herself on her. So it's simply a peck on the lips that lasts for a second too long.

The door to their office opens and the intruder makes a dumb, confused noise with the door still open. April and Ann break apart immediately, or as best they can, when the door opens but it's clear what they were doing. They both look up to see who it is, unsure who they'll have to try and explain this to.

This is exactly what Ann's worried about every day they go to work together.

This is exactly what makes April paralytic in fear at night.


	19. Hideaway - I

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The final stretch starts here.

Ann's eyes dart to the side, looking at the form freezing up on her knee. 

"I'm... just going to assume that I have no idea what I'm looking at," Ben raises his hand and waves confusedly at the pair of them. "Or that I'm hallucinating things. Yeah, that's-"

"Hey, Ben," Ann calls out before he can turn around and leave.

"Please don't say anything about this to Leslie," April stands up and walks over to him. "Ben, seriously-"

"Yes, I'll have a wonderful time lying to  _Leslie Knope_ ," he accents with a louder voice, slamming the door closed. "Why didn't you just tell us, April? Why didn't  _you_ , Ann?"

"I was afraid," April looks down and Ann immediately gets out of her chair, watching the two of them. 

"Of what?" Ben asks, incredulous. 

"That you'd know-"

"We're not homophobes, April," he says with a laugh. Ann doesn't think that's very funny at the moment, eying him further and wondering what the hell he could want. "So this is what you were talking about a while ago? God, you said you wanted to move on... we wouldn't have-"

That's definitely new. There wasn't anything April ever told her about this, but then again - and Ann realizes it with a little, bleak thought - she doesn't really tell her much anyways. Neither of them do, and maybe that's part of the cycle too. She'd figure out how to break that cycle one day, but not now.

"I didn't want you to know," April says, looking towards Ann for a moment. "I was... I'm ashamed of it."

"Why?"

"Because it's scary, okay?" April's shoulders slump and she dips her head forward, her hair covering her face fully.

"Well, we have to tell Leslie," Ben smiles again but April visibly shivers and moves a step away from him. "She'll want to know her best friend and you are dating. Especially after what happened-"

"Leave me alone," April mumbles. 

"It'll be okay, April," Ann tries to get in, and Ben takes note of her addition.

"It'll be okay. It's good to move on-"

Ann's eyes widen at that, because she knows that's the completely wrong thing to say to her. She moves forward, hoping to catch April from whatever emotion she lets out after that but it's too late for that now.

"I said leave me alone!" April shouts with her head still low, pushing forward and shoving Ben out of the way. 

She runs out of the door and down the hallway before Ann can catch her. By the time she's even looking for April there's no one anywhere near her office. Ben tries to apologize but Ann only grabs her things and tries to think of where she could have gone. To be honest, she could have gone anywhere. Ann would just have to pick each of them apart and figure out where April went. She stomps around, asking anyone if they'd seen a short, dark-haired girl but no one gives her much of an answer. 

Ben joins her in looking, and soon they enlist a confused Leslie. Neither Ben nor Ann say a word of what happened to her, only that April ran away from work and she seemed out of it. After scouring the entire floor, and checking the fourth floor for good measure, there wasn't much of a chance of April being anywhere in City Hall. 

They agree to split up and try to find her where they can - Leslie has to stay in City Hall, so she'd look when she had time, Ben could ask around and talk to anyone in the building but move around, and Ann decides to check April's house first. That's the most likely place, at least.

 

 

* * *

 

 

She runs. Tears are in her eyes and she runs.

Past doors and people, all of them asking questions, and past the thoughts and reality behind her. April runs. She tries to leave it all behind her, running from Ann and reality, just to find something she knows is real. She'll have to run, and find, and stay there. 

She runs and never intends to stop until she's crossing that street, and covering that corner, and walking past  _that_ gate. Dropping to her knees before she can even make it, she lets the tears take over and the silence of suburbia overwhelm everything inside of her. April lifts her head, attempting to look, but can't handle it and her eyes are forced down at the ground and away from him where they belong.


	20. Hideaway - II

Light cracks through the blur staining her vision, a little here and there splitting through the seams as she tries to calm down and find something to anchor her back to the ground. Curling her fingers in the grass just to feel something between her fingers that doesn't make her hate every second of this, she rips up and pounds away at the ground. With grass in her hand, little fists tightly wound up in fury, April slams them into the dirt over and over until her knuckles bruise. Little indents mar the bit of turf just beside the walkway, marks she's beaten into the ground, and it all still  _hurts_ so much that she can only slump forward and attempt to hold back her tears.

"I'm so sorry," she says to no one. 

No one's there to hear her and that's the way it should be. Andy's dead. He's gone  _forever_ and Ann was, is, could be... so many things. Help? A light at the end of this nightmare? All of them are unbearable thoughts because they confirm the reality around her, all tears and bruised knuckles. Cracked, bleeding skin and a broken heart trying to mend itself, and she just wants it all to end. The voices, real and imagined, and what she has to face now that people will know.

"I didn't mean to do it," she gets to her knees and looks directly ahead, sniffing loudly. "I didn't... I'm fucking lying."

Laughing aloud, she gets to her feet and slowly walks over to the little headstone. 

 _Beloved husband_. 

How many days has she spent looking at that epitaph, two little words? They barely described anything about him. Two words couldn't define what he meant to her. But, she can't stay like this and April knows it. Letting go feels like it could take an eternity she isn't ready to embark on, but she knows it's not alone. She doesn't have to be alone on that journey and it makes her fall back and stare at the stone with a dead stare.

What would he say? He'd cry. He'd beg her to come back, asking if it was his fault, and it would hurt  _so fucking_ _bad_ to see him like that and to make him like that, but what other choice does she have now? Still, it's almost impossible to let go of that last vestige of belief that this is all a nightmare gone on for too long. Touching the face of the stone, fingers tracing the little words that were left of him, April's hands shake all the while and mark them like she's going to forget what they say. What they really mean is still inside of her, and still a part of her, but she can't imagine giving him up. 

"I meant to do all of this," she whispers. "If they know... they'll think I gave up on you. You tried so hard, and I always made it seem like I never loved you. Where the fuck was I when you died? Across an ocean. I didn't even bother to show up..." 

She has to squeeze her eyes shut to ignore the blinding pain in her chest and the choking sobs demanding to be heard. Rolling her fingers inward back into that fist she has to push forward. 

"I don't know how I'm supposed to do this," she lets out the bleakest, mirthless little gasp of air that could be called a laugh. "Moving on. How am I supposed to... how do you move on from this?"

Ann could say whatever she wanted, but as much as she liked Ann and liked the distraction it hurt to even think of the word  _love_. There wasn't anything to give her and with everything Ann took in strides as pain not to mention the impossible sadness in April that drained her even more. It all makes her want to figure this out, being stretched two different ways when she  _thought_ this was over. She worked towards beating her habits, and breaking her fears over her knee, all with the help of Ann but it's unbearable trying to bridge that final gap.

It's childish, a back and forth and constantly rollercoasting her emotions, but April can't help it. That little wind that usually accompanies these visits never comes, a deadly still air around her. Finally opening her eyes again, April's still holding her fist against the stone. It's cold, and dead, and solid.

"I don't... they think this is easy. Ann thinks I can be something and I'm so afraid of it," she says softly, letting it all out in the silent loneliness. "What if I let you go? Andy, I don't want to... please don't hate me. I love you. So much, you don't even know, but how do I do this?"

She stares at the words, unchanging and forever carved into this silly little rock that's all that's left of him. People will forget Mouse Rat. They will forget his work with charity. Pawnee will forget who he was, and the people therein wouldn't ever have known who he was, but April can't let that happen. Yet, still, she has to. The world, like it does with anyone, will let Andy fall into a totally forgotten void of the dead and the lost. April won't ever get him back, but Ann  _is_ here. She won't let April forget him, and won't ever let her believe that loving again doesn't mean forgetting or giving up her love for him.

She has to, if not let go at least accept it. Finally, she has to accept who was there for her now. He couldn't be, but there was a woman willing to give up so much of her life just to find something here for April and to help her. April has to accept her life, and the people in it.

The first step taken, she looks at the back of her hand red and caked with dirt and blood. Standing up, she looks longingly at the stone before turning to leave.


	21. Hideaway - III

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another small break that was caused by a writing bug elsewhere, real life, and other things. 
> 
> I swear I'll get this finished soon! Even if it's disappointing or you don't like it, I won't be happy until I've finished this fic.

At her house, the metal is cold in her hand. The little jingling sound isn't merry or bright, and April isn't smiling at the feeling. Staring over her shoulder at the little cabinet, she takes in a deep breath and looks straight ahead. Each step is one foot in front of the other, but more than that. It hurts, and it's freeing but the most painful of excisions; an exorcism of everything bad in her bones, every little devil hiding in her blood at the thought that strives to find her mind and leave her with those  _thoughts_ that this is wrong and that she will die the moment she lets go. Each step  _hurts_ , but it's freedom in a way. A terrible, jagged breathing comes out of her in those steps like she's never done anything this difficult in her entire life.

The truth was, she hasn't.

Approaching the door, she lets shaky fingers find the right key. April kept adding more and more to the ring, hoping that hiding the exact one - one she can always see without having to separate them, that it doesn't matter how many there are on the ring she will always  _see_ \- would keep this reality further away. The demons in her thoughts cackle at the idea, and at her twitching hands. Another breath, a long one that carves out the biggest hole in her hopes that this is still a nightmare. It isn't, though, and she knows that. April knows that, but she has to continue. 

Sliding the key into the lock is loud, distinct, and creates a sharp, metallic  _thunk._ Yet, at the same time to April it's quiet. It's silent as far as April's concerned. Everything in her body and mind told her that it would break her in half to do this, this one little action, but it's easy. It's painless, and a simple task, and if anything was going to crush her the simplicity of that would do it. The realization that this is all she has to do, and that it's _okay_ to move on, could fill her mind and burn everything but hate and self-loathing out of it. It doesn't though, and when she turns the key it's not like snapping her spine and pushing on the door isn't like breaking every bone in her hand all at once. It's just a  _push_. A little  _push_ , and then the door's open.

She falls onto the bed at once, her eyes filling with cloudy wetness. April clutches the bedsheets still on there, inhaling deeply and letting everything come out of her; and trying to cry it out, to let it all wash over her in one, massive wave that would either kill her or let her find that freedom. Finally, this freedom.


	22. Hideaway - IV

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I condensed the idea of two chapters together for this.

All it took was opening that door, and now she can't even breathe anymore without the thoughts crashing through her mind and battering every sense with the idea that it's gone. It's over, and it's so  _easy_ it hurts to think it. But, somehow, it's all gone. It's all flowing freely out of her system and it feels so damn good to do it that she can't help but laugh once or twice. A maniacal fit or two, sure, but at this point April's willing to accept some crazy. After all, she's spent the last however many months - was it a year, she can't even remember - with nothing but these thoughts in her mind and now they're just falling, evaporating; they're just disappearing. Not all at once, but entering the room just makes everything feel so pointless and her fears begin to loosen their tight hold. Even if for a second, they let go.

Then, another door opens. The front door. A hurried pair of feet run inside the room with her, haggard breaths following. April rolls onto her back, looking up at Ann staring down at her. Blinking back the tears that have been haunting her for hours, April sits up. Expecting hurt there - she did  _abandon_ Ann back there - all that's there is worry and Ann falls to her knees, letting her hand go to April's on the bed. 

"You did it," she says with more than a hint of wonderment in her voice. 

April tilts her head up. "Did what?" she sounds different even in her own years; a ghost. "I'm just... in my bedroom."

"Yeah, you are," Ann nods. "You're right here. You did it."

April smiles weakly. "Where's Ben, and the rest of the mob?" she chuckles darkly, turning her hand to slip her fingers between Ann's and squeezing. 

"Still at City Hall," she explains, eyes focused on April. "Look, they're not going to do anything. What can they do? Fuck those people-"

"They'll know I gave up," April finally says, the words cold and tired in her mouth and waiting to be said for so long that they just  _fall_ out. 

"Gave what up?"

"Everything. That I couldn't be-"

"What, pitiful? They're going to know that you're alive. April, they're going to remember what you look like and the way your voice sounds. They're all going to see you and be so happy to see you again. Leslie's going to be  _so_ happy to see you again," Ann speaks with a determined clarity. It takes her back and April only sits and listens, looking at her face and trying to stay rapt in it. "You're  _here_ and we're here and it's... not going to be lonely anymore."

Sniffing, she blinks away another dose of wetness and nods her head. "It's going to be us."

"Us," Ann repeats. "No more... whatever we've been trying to pretend with here. It's just going to be us, and if they have a problem-"

"Fuck 'em," April says with a smile, making the kneeling woman chuckle.

"Do you wanna... talk about this," Ann waves around the room, its contents untouched save for the ruffled bedspread. "Or anything?"

"There's time for that later," April says quietly.

"You didn't give up," Ann repeats, "and if anything, you're only stronger and braver. You're braver than anyone I've ever known."

April smiles a real one this time, letting her lips curl up and Ann returns it eagerly. Leaning forward, she puts their joined hands to Ann's cheek and kisses her, just a chaste thing but deep enough to let her know she's there, and they break apart after only a sparse few moments together. Taking another look into a sight that makes her breaths quicken, and Ann's eyes are so  _happy_ and bright, April stands up and she follows. 

"So, you ready to go see what everyone has to say?" Ann asks her one last time, squeezing her hand and with that same light almost glowing around her. 

She looks around the room. It'll always be  _there_ , and constant, and part of her home. It'll always be something she's  _had_ but not where she is now, and to try to hold onto some vague idealism of what the room meant, and what going inside and leaving it, would mean was the same fear that propelled her back there and to the worries at the cemetery every time. Every single thought was that  _before_ and never touched upon the now, and the present. She doesn't have Andy, no, but she does have Ann. They're not the same, and she's no replacement. Nor should she be, but Ann is  _there_ and real.

"Yeah," April nods, sniffing and taking one deep breath before leaving the bedroom and closing the door behind her with a soft thud.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, that's the ending! Yeah. Um, thank you so much for following the story and reading, kudos, and commenting. Every single one of you that commented on this fic honestly kept the thing going. Without you, I dunno what I would've done. Quit, most likely. I didn't though, despite a monthlong hiatus and a few longer breaks between. This story would have haunted me forever if I hadn't finished it, but because of you (yes, you) it won't have to!
> 
> Yay!
> 
> However, with the good news comes the bad. As of this chapter, I'm done writing Ludkins. If you want my full reasoning, it's on my tumblr [here](http://anotheropti.tumblr.com/post/119309253192/well-i-mean-it-had-to-happen).
> 
> I won't be deleting or anything, after all it'd be completely against my intent, but this is the horribly grotesque final monument. No more tales to tell when this one is rotting at its very foundation as it is.

**Author's Note:**

> For RebeccaDopplemeyer because sometimes comments and a little back-and-forth can yield quite the inspiration :)


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